by Jeffrey Ford
“You always were a busy fellow,” I said.
He looked sternly at me for a moment, then broke into laughter. “I’m a family man now, Cley,” he said.
“You don’t say.”
“I thought you would be more surprised,” he said, looking somewhat disappointed.
“I’m here for a reason,” I said.
“Well, it’s good to see you,” he said. “I’m glad you came. Come, we’ll go to my quarters, where we can talk.”
I followed him out of the lab and around the corner of the building. Behind the structure, in a lot cleared of the ubiquitous rubble of the city, we passed a row of ten large cages, each containing a man. Upon seeing us, the occupants cried out to be released in the most pathetic voices. I noticed that the two at the end of the row were not men at all but had begun some process that was transforming them into werewolves.
“Silence, gentlemen,” said Below to his prisoners. “Who needs a visit to the metal chair?”
His words made them cease their groaning as they cowered away from the doors of their cages.
“What is this atrocity?” I asked.
“Now, now, Cley,” he said. “These men came to my city with the express purpose of robbing me. They are criminals. I’m helping them to become useful.”
“What have you done to those two on the end?” I asked.
“Well, that’s the way they are all headed. Greta needs some playmates. What better way to protect my city than a pack of werewolves? Consider the lesson they are all learning. They are being transformed from thieves into guardians.”
“That’s horrible,” I said.
“Let’s try not to judge each other while you are here, Cley. Ideological differences shouldn’t come between old friends. I hope that we can agree to disagree.”
It was hard for me to ignore the suffering I witnessed, but I told myself that there was nothing I could do about it. These men would become werewolves, and I, myself, would kill quite a few of them. I had to concentrate on getting the book. “Very well,” I said.
“Very well, indeed,” said Below, and patted me on the back.
We walked through the rubble, heading for the Ministry of Information.
“I understand you have become a vegetable salesman,” he said, smiling.
“I gather and trade herbs and other medicines of the forest.”
“Primitive,” he said. “But, you also deliver children. Now, being a father, I can appreciate this.”
“Do you have a son or daughter?” I asked.
“A son,” said Below, actually beaming with pride. “You might say he is much like me in many ways.”
“I look forward to meeting him,” I said. “And who is the mother?”
“She is wild and untamed … deep and mysterious, but paradise is in her heart.”
“Who is she?” I asked.
“The Beyond,” he said. “My son is the demon I brought back with me from the territory. I tell you, Cley, I am not lying to you in any way when I say that I truly love him.”
“I beg your pardon, Master, but this creature …”
“I know what you are thinking. It is hard for you to imagine how I have helped him. He speaks human language. He no longer eats meat. He reads. He thinks. He is good, Cley. You will approve of him, I’m telling you. Perhaps it was the last result of the white fruit. After it completely destroyed all of my possessions, it left me one gift. The ability to love. I would do anything for him.”
“I am amazed,” I said, and even though I knew the tale, to hear Below speak these words was a miracle I never thought I would witness. “What is his name?”
“Misrix. I named him after a certain adept who lived three centuries ago. A great man as I expect my boy to be someday.” He stopped walking and put his hand on my arm. “You must try very hard not to react to his demon appearance. Please, treat him as if he were …”
“Normal?” I said.
The Master quietly nodded, and we continued. For the remainder of our journey, he questioned me quite specifically about the daily life at Wenau. He inquired about certain people he had known who might still be alive and also as to the whereabouts of Arla and Ea. When we reached the Ministry of Information, we did not enter through the remains of the public baths, but Below produced a key, and we went through a side door in a part of the massive structure that was still completely intact.
He led me down into the basement and to one of the rooms in the long hallway lined with doors, at the end of which was the very place that in my true reality of the future, he lay wasting away with the sleeping disease. It twisted my thinking for a moment when I considered that if I went down the hallway to that room and waited long enough, I would meet myself.
The room, with the exception of the fact that there were no windows, was an exact duplicate of the parlor in which I first met Anotine back on the floating island. I took a seat at the table. He very cordially served me a glass of Rose Ear Sweet and pushed a pack of Hundred-To-Ones, a box of matches, and an ashtray toward me.
“Relax for a moment, Cley. I’ll be right back,” he said, leaving me alone in the room.
I tried to appear calm, knowing that my only chance of snatching the book was in waiting and watching for just the right opportunity, but every moment longer I spent exchanging small talk, Anotine withered toward a memory form I would no longer be able to touch. I sipped my drink and lit a cigarette out of nervousness.
The door opened, and Below entered. “Cley, I want you to meet my son, Misrix,” he said.
I stood and put my hand out. The demon came forth with his head bowed and his hands folded in front of him. There would have been no hope for me if I had been seeing him for the first time. I probably would have run screaming from the room, but as it was, I think Below was impressed with my calm demeanor as I coaxed Misrix with a nod of my head to shake hands with me.
“I like your spectacles,” I said to him. “You appear to be a very intelligent young man.”
“Yes, the spectacles. A little much,” said Below.
“No, I’m serious,” I said.
“Thank you,” said Misrix, his fangs showing in a bashful smile.
He sat down with the Master and myself at the table, and I asked him about the books he was reading. The demon took to me and was expounding on some of the more recent volumes he had gone through, when Below interrupted.
“He’s quite a fan of the Physiognomy,” he said.
“Your father is a genius,” I said to Misrix, and from the corner of my eye, I could see Below smiling.
I offered the demon a cigarette from the pack lying in front of me, and though he immediately declined, I could see his nervousness when the subject was brought up in front of his father.
Finally, Below dismissed Misrix, telling him to go back to the lab and check on the prisoners. When the demon had left, Below turned to me and asked, “All right, Cley, you handled yourself very well there. What is it you want?”
“I know you have been working on the production of a certain disease that induces sleep,” I said.
“Very good, Cley,” said the Master. “We have both been doing some spying, I can see.”
“I want the antidote,” I said.
Below grinned and rubbed his chin. “You want the antidote,” he said. “Well, I can give you that.”
“You can?” I said.
“Why not. But first, for old time’s sake, I want you to indulge in the beauty with me. I have perfected the drug to be a hundred times more powerful than it was. The tiniest droplet mixed with water will do the job that an entire syringe of the stuff uncut used to do. If you’ll do this with me, I’ll tell you anything you like.”
I would be a fool if I wasn’t suspicious of the deal he laid out for me, but there was no choice. Besides, the day had progressed to the point where I would soon be needing a fix to quell the urge of my addiction.
“Yes,” I said. “Certainly, for old time’s sake.”
T
he Master seemed a little surprised at my willingness, but with a fluttering of his hands, he conjured two needles. “I haven’t lost any of my magic,” he said as he passed one of the needles across the table to me.
He immediately went for the vein in his neck as I had seen him do on many an occasion in the past. For me it was more difficult. I had not taken the needle in years, and I had to think for a moment through the process of self-injection. I rolled up my sleeve, bent my arm, and made a fist. The moment I lifted the hypodermic it all came flooding back to me. I got into the vein as easy as putting a key in a lock. In making love to Anotine the effects of the drug were somewhat delayed in comparison to the needle, which deposited the beauty directly into the bloodstream.
When the empty syringes lay on the table between us, and we stared into each other’s bleary eyes, Below asked, “How did you know about the sleeping disease?”
“The same way I know about the metal, exploding birds,” I said, and laughed at finally having the upper hand on the Master.
“You’ve been delving into magic?” asked Below.
“Just your mind,” I said. “Now, you promised me the antidote.”
“I’ve already given it to you,” he said.
“I’m not that high,” I said. “What is it?”
“I just gave it to you,” he said.
“No …” I began to protest, but then it came clear to me. “The beauty?” I asked. “Is it the beauty?”
He nodded. “It has many purposes. When you are awake, it makes you forget; but when you are asleep, it reminds you to wake up.”
“No,” I said.
“Cley, you somehow know about the bird and the disease, so let me tell you the rest. The antidote has to be the beauty, because once I infect the people of Wenau with the sleeping sickness, I can then show up on the scene and become a hero for curing them. They will learn to respect me because I will have saved their loved ones’ lives. In addition to this, I will introduce the beauty into the culture of Wenau, and soon I will be a most necessary figure since I am the only one capable of making it.”
“Tour plan is to spread addiction?”
“Call it what you like,” he said.
“But why?”
“I want your people to accept my son, and I know they won’t unless I coerce them. I must persuade them to see him as part of your society. I won’t live forever, and I need to be sure he will have a normal life ahead of him. If he stays here with me, he’ll become as mad as I am, and when I die there will be nothing to stop him from reverting back to his savage ways.”
“You mean, you are doing this out of love?” I said.
“He’s my son. Not having had any children, I don’t expect you to understand the depth of my feeling.”
“But there is no need for this. He would be accepted anyway, on his own merits.”
“Don’t be a fool, Cley. They would drive him out of town, hunt him down, and kill him.”
“You speak of love, but your methods are all about tyranny, slavery, murder.”
“It’s too late for me to change completely. I know now there is a better way, but I am too tired to go back to the beginning. Truth lies at the end of a circle, Cley. We both have learned that by now. It’s also too late for you. I can’t have you ruining this plan as well. It appears I forgot to water down the beauty that was in your syringe. When next you awaken, I will be making a wolf of you. So good to have seen you once more. After tomorrow, you, like the other thieves, will have become my guardian.”
He stood up a little unsteadily, walked to the door, opened it, and left. I jumped to my feet, took two steps, and then my head exploded.
29
When next I opened my eyes, I was strapped to the operating table in Below’s lab. I could see through the entrance and places where the walls had broken down that it was morning, meaning I had spent the entire night under the influence of the new, more potent sheer beauty. There had been visions, hallucinations more intense than anything I had ever experienced. Of this, I was certain, but exactly what they were was unclear. I vaguely remembered conversing with Brisden about some philosophical point, and at another juncture I had danced with the monkey, Silencio. There were other scraps of images that also returned: a three-masted ship battling high seas, a bitten piece of the white fruit sporting half a green worm, an animated etching in liquid mercury of the Delicate pursuing us. The only part of it that I was sure of was that a radiant vision of Anotine had been with me through it all.
I was dazed and weak from the experience, but I longed to see her and worried about her condition. My promise had been that I would return quickly, and I felt each minute that had passed since I left her side to be another brick in a wall that would separate us forever. Looking to the left of me, I could see clearly the open entrance to the lab, my path to freedom, but try as I might I could not budge the straps that were tightened around my chest and legs. To the right were all of Below’s bizarre experiments, the tables holding clear jars of heads, jars of gilled fetuses, liquid rainbows, gears made of bone. Every now and then, at odd intervals, the diminutive lighthouse would begin to glow and the lab was filled with the darting figures of birds. These songs, in conjunction with the howling of the prisoners out back in their cages, combined to make a music that was driving me mad.
I tested my bonds again, this time crying out in order to add the force of my voice to my overall effort. When that didn’t work, I simply began screaming, because I could think of nothing else to do. Thrashing my head back and forth wildly, I let loose with the sum total of my frustration.
I had nearly grown hoarse when Misrix appeared at the entrance. He stepped into the lab and passed by me, trying very hard not to make eye contact. I turned my head and followed his progress. Walking over to one of the tables, he lifted an object and started back. I couldn’t help but smile when I saw that what he had retrieved was the memory book. This was my last chance.
“Misrix,” I called to him. “Demon, I have a secret for you.”
He averted his eyes from me as he made for the doorway.
“I can tell you the meaning of that white fruit you found in the ruins.”
He stopped for a second, his back still facing me.
“I can tell you how it fits into the story of the City,” I said. Of course, I had no idea what I was going to say, but I needed to get his attention.
He slowly came around to face me. “How do you know about the white fruit?” he asked.
“It’s in your museum, is it not?”
He stepped closer, moving his wings, and their breeze washed over me.
“My father told you,” he said.
I shook my head. “I simply know. That fruit is the key to the story you have been piecing together, and I know exactly where it fits in.”
“Tell me,” he said, using a claw of his free hand to push his spectacles back up the bridge of his thin nose.
“Loosen my straps, here. Let me get up and stretch my arms and legs, and I’ll tell you,” I said.
He laughed like a goat bleating. “My father would be very angry if I were to do that,” he said. “He’s waiting for me to bring him his book. I must go.”
“No, you can’t. He’s going to turn me into one of those creatures,” I said.
“He said you need to become one. He told me that was your reason for returning to the city, so that you could be made different.”
“He lies,” I said. “All I want is to be let go.”
He shook his head and started to turn away.
“One more minute,” I said.
He waited and looked back over his shoulder.
“You say your father will be angry if you help me. Just think of his disappointment when I tell him that you coupled with the wolf-girl, Greta Sykes.”
The barbed tip of his tail snapped the air an inch from my eyes. “That is not true,” he said.
“You know it is true, and he will know it is true. Do you think there is anything that
your father cannot know, any truth he cannot uncover if given a clue? Three pairs of spectacles will not make you seem any less a beast after he knows you have joined with the werewolf.”
He stood there staring down at me.
“Did you have a cigarette afterward?” I asked.
He winced at this remark, and I laughed out loud.
I thought for a moment that he was going to ignore me, but then I realized he was moving away only to place the memory book down on the seat of the metallic chair. He came back to me and, with two precise swipes of his claws, severed the straps.
Sliding off the table, I reached down into my boot and retrieved the Lady Claw I had carried with me from the island. I handed it to him. “Give this to him,” I said. “Tell him you found it next to the table. He will think I escaped on my own.”
“Yes,” he said, and I could see the concept of deception dawning in his expression.
I grabbed him by the shoulders and put my face up to his. “Now go, quickly,” I shouted. “Hurry.” He left the room and, once outside, took off running.
Lifting the book from where he had laid it on the chair, I opened the cover and found the loose pages filled with rows of symbols rendered in a perfectly black ink. I had no time to sort them out just then, I had to get away from the city. The minute that Below knew of my escape, he would be after me. There was no stumbling to my run now as I headed out the door and began to retrace the path that Greta had used to bring me to the lab. I thought only of Anotine, especially those quiet, unamazing moments when we simply talked and shared the present. It was this that I was desperate to get back to again.
My greatest concern was Greta. I expected her to come bounding out of some shadowed nook of debris at any moment. It was still morning, though, and I remembered Misrix having told me that the werewolves did not usually awaken till noon. This must have been the case, because I cleared the crumbling walls of the city with no incident. When I stepped out onto the fields of Harakun, I felt a great surge of energy, thinking, “I’ve done it. I have the book. I have the antidote.” I ran like a demon.
I covered half the distance to the tree line where I had entered the fields the previous day before I began to lose my stamina. A sharp pain had developed in my left knee, causing me to gallop awkwardly like Quismal inspired by fear. Still I kept going, heaving for air. “How many times am I going to have to dash across these damn fields,” I thought to myself as the sun began to work its harsh process on me again.