by Paula Volsky
“We will eat. This way, I believe,” Girays commanded, indicating a nearby half-open door.
“I am not hungry, sir. I will await you outside, if you please.” The driver exited at a smart pace.
Girays hesitated, half inclined to follow. Ridiculous. His stomach was empty, he had stopped at this place to lunch, and that was what he would do. Limping stiffly to the doorway, he went through into the common room beyond, where he stopped dead on the threshold. The butcher-shop odor intensified, and the buzzing of countless flies filled his ears.
For a moment he scarcely comprehended the scene before him. The common room was a desolation of overturned furniture, smashed crockery, and sprawling, mutilated corpses. Something like a dozen bodies lay there, perhaps more; accurate count was difficult at a glance. One of them, flung down on its back in a clotted red pool at the front of the room, had been decapitated. The crushed remains of a silver-haired head lay not far away. Blood splashed the floor and walls, even spattered the ceiling, but Girays hardly saw it. His eyes shot to the center of the mercilessly sunlit room, where Karsler Stornzof, upright and utterly still, confronted a floating formless cloud of vapor.
Formless? For an instant Girays imagined the cloud shaped like a man, but the fancy passed at once and he saw only a dark smudge of mist that paled smoothly into transparency as he watched.
When the vapor was gone, or at least invisible, Stornzof staggered, grabbing for support at the nearest chair still standing. He missed it and fell to his knees, head bowed and chest heaving. Girays limped toward him as quickly as partially frozen muscles allowed, pausing only long enough to snatch up an open bottle of wine from a tabletop in passing.
Stornzof looked up, face drawn with exhaustion. Girays wordlessly extended the bottle. Stornzof took it and gulped down half the contents, then offered it back.
“Keep it,” Girays advised. “Hurt?”
The other shook his head.
“What happened?” Girays’s eyes scanned the room almost unwillingly.
“Receptivity.”
“What?”
“Arcane visitant.”
Oddly enough, Girays doubted neither the Grewzian’s sanity nor veracity. “Did the visitant do all this?” he inquired.
Stornzof inclined his head.
“But it’s gone now? It’s been driven off?”
“Modified out of existence.”
“Modified? By you?”
“It was something I had knowledge of.” Stornzof spoke unevenly, his breath still ragged. “This Receptivity’s form was molded by the expectations and perceptions of its beholders. By fixing its attention exclusively upon myself, I assumed control of its aspect, which I was able to alter gradually until at last my mind withheld all recognition, and the Receptivity ceased to be.”
“Where did it come from?”
“That is a sorry tale, and I am very tired.”
“What will you do, then?”
“Sleep. For the rest of the day, I believe.”
“Not here, I trust. I cannot recommend the atmosphere. I’ve a hired carriage waiting in front. It will take us both to the railroad station, and you can sleep on the train.”
“The offer is generous and I accept with gratitude.”
“Then wait a moment while I find some food. I was ravenous until just now, and my appetite’s sure to return as soon as I leave this slaughterhouse.” Girays hobbled to the kitchen, appropriated some cheese, apples, a cold chicken, a couple of loaves, and a couple of bottles, then returned to find Stornzof standing grey faced and shaky, but upright.
“You are injured?” Stornzof inquired, evidently noting the uneven gait.
“No. Some anonymous well-wisher tampered with yesterday’s lunch. Doctor doesn’t expect the effects to last.”
“Yes.” Something like a shadow darkened Stornzof’s eyes. “Luzelle told me of your misfortune.”
“Luzelle? When did you see her, and where?”
“Here, but do not concern yourself. She left hours ago, and she was quite safe. I should imagine she found her way to the depot and caught the four forty-eight southbound, according to her design.”
“That sounds like Luzelle. You’re certain she was unharmed?”
“Entirely certain.”
“Then she’s probably on that train and almost to Tophzenk by now. You realize what this means.”
“She will reach Toltz tomorrow morning. We cannot hope to overtake her now.”
“Barring sudden disaster, the race is hers.”
“It is astonishing to you then, to think that she must win?”
“Not entirely,” Girays answered. “She has insisted from the beginning that she would.”
SHE HAD FALLEN INTO A LIGHT DOZE, but the groan of the brakes woke her. Luzelle turned her head and looked out the window. The train was pulling into the station. The sign above the platform read TOLTZ. She stared at it almost in amazement.
The train halted and the engine cut off. Passengers stood and began pulling their bags from the overhead rack. Luzelle had no bag. Rising to her feet, she strolled unencumbered to the end of the car, waited for the conductor to open the door, and descended three steps to the platform.
The morning air was soft and warm. By afternoon of this summer day the temperature would probably climb to uncomfortable levels, but for now it was perfect. She made for the station at a quick pace, almost a trot, but halfway there it occurred to her that she did not need to hurry. Her rivals were far behind. She slowed to a walk.
Reaching the station, she crossed the waiting room. Before she reached the front exit, a solid figure clothed in an ill-fitting suit and battered straw hat materialized squarely athwart her path. She halted.
“Miss Devaire, isn’t it?” inquired the stranger in the Vonahrish of Sherreen. “Miss Luzelle Devaire?”
She nodded. He reeked of cheap cigars and cheaper cologne. She resisted the impulse to turn her face away.
“Stique Breuline of the Sporting Gazette, at your service. Miss Devaire, I offer you my assistance as escort and protector from here to the registrar’s office at city hall in exchange for your exclusive statement upon successful completion of—”
“No.” Sidestepping the obstacle, Luzelle resumed progress. Stique Breuline stumbled in her wake. He was jabbering at her, probably trying to extract some sort of statement or concession. She hardly noticed what he said, it was meaningless noise, but his persistence attracted attention—of fellow journalists perhaps, or else of the idly curious—and soon a small crowd was following on her heels.
She did not care. Questions and comments were flying at her, but she easily ignored them all. Straight through the waiting room she marched, out the front door, and into one of the clumsy, comfortable Hetzian hansoms that waited in the street before the station.
“City hall,” she commanded in careful Hetzian, and the vehicle moved at once. Luzelle settled back into the soft seat. The streets went by unheeded. Only once did she look back to discover at least three carriages following her. Somebody in one of them was waving a bright yellow scarf out the window. A signal of some sort?
More streets, and then the hansom entered Irstreister Square, which she had last glimpsed smothered in black smoke. Straight ahead rose the ornate city hall, with people waiting there on the steps before the entrance. The driver pulled up. Luzelle paid him, alighted, and hurried up the steps. The group clogging her path made way magically for her as she advanced, but she realized that every eye clung to her; that the queries, comments, and congratulations were meant for her—in short, that they knew who she was, and presumably had been waiting for her. Yes, that yellow scarf had certainly been a signal.
She crossed the lofty foyer, her entourage swelling as she went, exited into a hallway, and discovered that the route to the registrar’s office remained imprinted upon her mind. She did not need to ask directions, but made her way unhesitatingly along the corridors, the eager audience following.
She reached the
office, and a sense of unreality filled her, yet her heartbeat quickened almost painfully. The clerk on duty looked up as she entered, and she saw by his face that he recognized her.
The crowd at her back had gone intensely silent. As she advanced to the desk, she could hear the tap of her footsteps, and even the pounding of her heart. She surrendered her documents to the clerk, who required no instruction. The solidly audible thud of his inked stamp on her passport—the final stamp officially verifying completion of the course—broke the spell of silence, and the cheers exploded as the crowd surged forward to surround her. Luzelle saw enthusiastic faces with open mouths, and the noise beat at her ears, but the words were a jumble. She could not understand them and certainly could not answer, for her throat was tight, her eyes were filling with tears, and the sense of unreality was stronger than ever. She looked down at the passport that was somehow back in her hand, and it was only the evidence of the stamp—Toltzcityhouse, Lower Hetzia, with the date and hour, 11:36 A.M.—that convinced her the race was truly over.
24
THE HAIRDRESSER AND COSMETICIAN furnished by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs departed and the door closed behind them. The lady’s maid likewise furnished by the ministry curtsied and retired, her services unwanted for the moment. Abandoning all dignity, Luzelle raced through the lavish chambers of the Kingshead Hotel’s best suite, back to the bedroom with its great cheval glass in a gilded frame, before which she planted herself, wild to discover just what they had done to her.
She stared into the mirror and hardly recognized herself. Her reflected face was almost comically wide eyed. They had squeezed her into a glorious gown of pale aquamarine silk heavily embroidered with gold around the hem, that bared her shoulders, arms, and most of her bosom. The torturous corset beneath the gown, while reducing her waist to nothingness, was boned and angled to lift her breasts and push them together. The resulting display of rounded flesh threatened to overspill the low neckline.
Tasteless. Common. She could almost hear His Honor’s voice. The vulgarity of your appearance … But no, this revealing mode was the height of fashion, flaunted by stylish women in all the western capital cities, and there could be no denying that she had the figure for it. So His Honor was welcome to say what he pleased; she wouldn’t care. Not that her father was likely to say anything at all. In the ten days that had passed since she walked into the city hall in Toltz, accounts of her victory had decorated the front pages of newspapers everywhere. Udonse Devaire must have read about it, but he had not deigned to acknowledge his daughter’s accomplishment. Her mother had sent a plaintively congratulatory letter two days earlier, but from her father—nothing. No, His Honor was hardly apt to concern himself with the dress she wore to this evening’s reception at the Waterwitch Palace.
Nor was he likely to concern himself with her jewelry, hair, or face, and that was all to the good. The hair—piled up in careless tousled curls with many an artfully placed straying tendril, and dusted with gold powder—His Honor would have pronounced ostentatious. The jewelry—on loan for this one night only, it had been made very clear, and consisting of a magnificent emerald necklace with matching drop earrings—the Judge would have deemed unsuitable for an unmarried woman. And the face—she didn’t like to think what he would say about that, she had her own doubts on the subject. Never mind that the cosmetician, a professional from the Toltz Opera, together with the dressmaker responsible for the aquamarine gown, had both agreed that ladies of the highest rank in society were now beginning to affect facial cosmetics. Never mind that the cosmetician had painted with the light and subtle hand of an artist. The alteration in her appearance was marked. The dark stuff delicately applied to her lashes widened and brightened her eyes to a startling degree. The blushing powder stroked sparingly across her cheeks brought her face to almost excessively vivid life. And the rosy, glossy paste smoothed onto her lips ripened her mouth beyond the bounds of proper moderation. The overall effect was unequivocally—she groped for the right adjective—alluring.
She had been running from party to gala to reception to party all week long, and she had never dreamed of displaying herself in such a guise. But tonight was the night of the Grand Ellipse victor’s audience with Miltzin IX, and the aims of the ministry’s minions were only too clear. Well, she had known about that from the start. She had accepted the ministry’s terms along with its financial backing, and now it was time to fulfill her part of the bargain.
Luzelle’s mirrored reflection frowned. Bargain or no bargain, she did not have to let them paint and varnish her like some sort of mannequin. Nor did she have to let them present her breasts to Mad Miltzin like two tidbits on a platter of appetizers. She still had time to change the dress, to scrub the cosmetics from her face, to pull her hair back into a tight little knot, to make herself as unattractive as possible.…
She was searching for a cloth with which to wipe the rosy paste from her lips when a knock on the door of her suite halted her and her frown deepened, for she knew at once who it was. He had visited her twice within the last three days, and would certainly put in an appearance tonight. For a moment she thought of ignoring the knock, but that would be pointless as well as cowardly, and in any case the borrowed maid had magically materialized and was already opening the door.
“Good evening, Miss Devaire.” The visitor smiled courteously.
“Good evening, Deputy Underminister.” Scrupulously suppressing every external sign of irritation, Luzelle produced a smile of her own, for vo Rouvignac deserved civility. The man was only doing his job in checking up on her, and he had traveled all the way from Sherreen to do so. It was not his fault that she had come to dread the sight of his studious face and the sound of his cultivated voice. It was surely not his fault that she contemplated tonight’s culmination of her endeavor with a distaste verging on disgust. He had not forced her to accept the ministry’s offer; she had done it of her own free will. Not his fault, and she shouldn’t resent him, but she did.
“Do come in.” Her smile stayed firmly in place.
“Thank you.” He stepped into the plush sitting room. The maid closed the door behind him and disappeared. “You are looking splendid.”
Good enough to pass inspection? Stifling the hostile retort, she responded correctly, “How kind. Won’t you sit down, Deputy Underminister? May I offer you a sherry?”
“No and no. I do not intend to stay. I have called only to offer my best wishes, and to satisfy myself that you are ready and well prepared for this evening’s venture.”
Come to make sure the automaton’s properly wound? Aloud she replied, “I ought to be prepared by now, Deputy Underminister. You’ve taken considerable pains these past few days to see to it that I am well instructed. I know all about His Majesty Miltzin’s favorite books, plays, and poets, his hobbies and interests, his favorite foods, his favorite wines, his favorite dogs and horses, his taste in tailors and bootmakers, his likes and dislikes—loves salmon mousse, hates salmon soufflé, loves cockfighting, hates bearbaiting—you see? I think I’m reasonably capable of carrying on a conversation with the man.”
“And of making yourself agreeable?”
“Yes. I’ll be very agreeable. I’ll be so agreeable that he’ll fancy himself the most fascinating, witty, irresistible monarch ever to grace a throne. I’ll be so agreeable that he’ll think he’s tumbled into a vat of treacle. So agreeable that his teeth start to rot from the sheer sweetness of it all. Is that agreeable enough?”
“Perhaps too much so. You deal with a jaded royal palate, remember. Insipid amiability is unlikely to engage His Majesty’s interest. Nor is it in keeping with your own character. You might do better to be more yourself.”
And if I were, then I wouldn’t offer Miltzin IX of the Low Hetz anything beyond a polite curtsy. She said nothing.
Vo Rouvignac eyed her at length and finally asked, “You are willing to proceed with this project, Miss Devaire?”
“Project. An interesting term. I
’ve given my word, haven’t I? Of course I’ll perform as promised. I will take advantage of tonight’s private audience to secure King Miltzin’s promise to sell the secret of the Sentient Fire to Vonahr, at a very handsome price. I am authorized to offer as much as twenty-five million New-rekkoes—”
“That has changed, as of today. You may now go as high as forty.”
“Forty. How did that happen?”
“Circumstances press.”
“I see.” She resumed the recitation, “I will use any and every persuasive means at my command to sway His Majesty in Vonahr’s favor.”
“Should you fail, however—”
“Then I will do my best, at the very least, to discover the location of the clever Master Nevenskoi’s secret workroom. There now, Deputy Underminister. Satisfied?”
“That you have learned your lessons by rote? Quite.” Vo Rouvignac studied her perfectly painted face. “But memorization is not the key to success. Nor is pure determination, although it helps. Allow me to observe that the reluctance, tension, and resentment that you presently project in nearly tangible waves are hardly apt to win His Majesty’s favor.”
“Nearly tangible?”
“I assure you.”
“Well, don’t worry. By the time I come face-to-face with the king, everything will be fine.”
“I wonder. His Majesty’s susceptibility to beauty is proverbial, and yet he is not altogether devoid of perception. It is possible, however, that you might reconcile yourself the better to your task if you would pause to recall exactly why you have undertaken it.”
Freedom, Luzelle thought. Fortune, fame, success, independence.
“Personal reasons, selfish reasons,” she answered slowly. After a moment she added, “All along I’ve thought of nothing but winning the race. I never considered what must follow, never stopped to remember what you explained so clearly the first day we met—that you and the ministry regard my success as purely a means to an end. I knew it, but always managed to ignore it. And now the debt has fallen due.”