City of Corpses

by John C. Wright

  “What? I did not send them! Me?”

  “You were in the burrowing vehicle made by one of the Anarchists, the one called Saturday. If you are not his, why were you in his machine? You had the shadow door the Anarchists stole from Sarras. It was an antique.”

  “But why would I have–?” Yumiko started to ask. But then she stopped, for she realized that while she had heard about the raid on the Glass Tower, she herself had no memory of the event. Onlookers had seen her there. They had seen on whose side she had seemed to stand. But she was acting covertly now, wearing a false name, deceiving onlookers. Why not then?

  Upon seeing Yumiko’s hesitation, Malen allowed her cruel smile to take on a sharper angle. “All you Twilight people squabble among yourselves right enough, but you drop your quarrels readily if the opportunity arises to deal the purer blood some hurt, do you not? It is in the nature of the lower orders. You are all anarchists at heart. Lawless. You have no discipline. That is why we rule you, and that is why you need us to rule you.”

  Anger made Yumiko blush. “We are not like that! I am not like that!”

  Malen stood up. “Are you not? A line of policemen are sleeping yonder, but will soon wake. You are a murderess several times over. Turn yourself in.”

  Yumiko shook her head a rapid shake.

  Malen said, “No? Return the ring you have stolen. It is a precious relic of the elfs. No one of your world has any right to it.”

  Yumiko shook her head again, but now with a slow and deliberate movement.

  Malen laughed. The echo of laughter inside Yumiko’s head was louder and harsher than what ears carried. “Very well then. Keep it! The ring will bring you to Hell soon enough. Let the Anarchists undermine Erlkoenig. Nothing has been right since Alberec grew soft and traded thrones with his son. I don’t like the way the king treats my brother. Why is Listenoise no longer in my family’s hands? Can you answer me that, girl?”

  Yumiko bowed. “I know nothing of such affairs.”

  “Nor I of yours.” Malen said, “Nor care. I resent that in the crystal perfection of my elfin memory, I will carry your name a thousand years after you are dust, and then ten thousand more. How to make the memory more pleasing?”

  Yumiko found her body shaking with fear. Once again, she had the clear intuition that this was a mood being put upon her from the outside. She closed her eyes.

  The voice of Malen was malicious music. “Suppose I turn you into an eel and throw you in the sea? There you would be without hand or foot, mute and ugly, and unable to step on land. What vengeance could you work on me then, disciple of Winged Vengeance? Well, girl? What would you do?”

  Yumiko opened her eyes, and there was no fear in them. “Pray for your immortal soul.” And this answer surprised her, for she had meant to say something else entirely.

  Malen subsided, and some of the pale beauty of her face departed, and her eyes were sad and reflected only the sunlight here.

  “Elfs cannot return to paradise. The Second Adam undid the evils done by the First Adam,” Malen said softly, “But we have no part in either. We did not fall with the first. We will not rise with the second. Your filthy human blood grants you some advantage after all.”

  Malen raised her hands. The men crawling at her feet, eating grass, now stood, but their eyes were still blank. “In courtesy to Erlkoenig, I shall allow the sun to end their bovine dreams.”

  Yumiko said, “And the trees?”

  Malen looked at her sidelong. “You said not to kill them. They are not dead. They live! As trees.”

  Yumiko fell to her knees, put her hands on the grass, palms down, and bowed her head to touch her hands. Her shining black hair spilled across the green grass. “Please restore them, milady.”

  Malen’s voice was no longer in her head. It sounded almost like a human voice. “Why do you plead for them? You were maiming them a moment ago. They are not your race. They are not your blood. And yet you humble yourself to me… for them? You are not the disciple of any Winged Vengeance, or any vengeance, winged or afoot. What is wrong with you? Explain yourself!”

  Yumiko looked up. “I fell in love with a boy. He is missing, and I must find him. All these young men here, they sought my life, true! But if they do not return to their sweethearts, then why should mine be returned to me?”

  Malen began to laugh. “You cannot be the girl I thought you were. She served revenge and was bound by vow. There is no returning from the dead. She would have known her own master’s face. Someone has played a trick on you, or on me, or on both of us!”

  Now Malen laughed more. “Yes, yes, I will let the sunlight burn the charm away, and the trees will be a mob again, and all will forget this day. It is within my jurisdiction, for the great streams and currents of the Black Spell concerning bloodshed and battles are all mine to command. I do it as a courtesy to Erlkoenig! I do it as a courtesy to you! For you have fooled me utterly as I thought you were the Foxmaiden, the sidekick of the dreadful vigilante! Or whoever enchanted you fooled me.”

  “But I am she. I am!”

  “No! No more! The jest has run!” said Malen, clutching her slender stomach and still swaying with mirth, rolling her eyes here and there. “It was a diversion, an amusement. Rarely does a masquerade or well-woven illusion hoodwink me. I will not regret to remember this in ten thousand years! The little drudge at the dance hall, who flourishes her bosom and shakes her bottom for coins! In the very building Lucien owns! I thought you were the disciple of the deadliest fighter in three worlds! Well played! Well played.”

  Malen made a gesture. A sensation like a fading dream which slips out of memory touched Yumiko as swiftly as a stolen kiss and was gone. The wrinkles and stains in Yumiko’s silk kimono vanished. The fabric was clean and pressed, the rips neatly stitched. Her face and hands were cool, freshly bathed, and her hair was shampooed, dried, and brushed. Someone had mended and washed her clothing. Yumiko wondered about the instantaneous creatures dwelling in dreams Malen had earlier mentioned. Perhaps Malen had maidservants there as well, who could perform an hour of chores in an instant.

  The trees and grass were gone. The street was as before, and the men also, save that they stood swaying on their feet, eyes open, fast asleep, many of them snoring.

  “So I have seen the daylit men,” Malen was saying. “So what? What changes I was promised! Nothing changes. I saw the plebeians rioting for bread in Rome, the Blue and Green racing factions rioting for games in Constantinople, and the pagans in Alexandria in tumult against the followers of the Galilean, rioting over nothing. Only their toys are different. Why my brother Garlot meddles with these herd animals… ugh! Why not nap a hundred years until the matter settles itself?

  “It is nothing to me!” she continued. “Let Garlot slay whom he must. I will return to Is-Elfydd.” She pronounced it Iss-Ailveeth. “I shall return to the fairest Land Beneath the Land, and be done with you. Gather up my parcels. Quickly, now! I will summon steeds. Can you ride a stag?”

  3. The Doors of Is-Elfydd

  As stately as kings in procession, two deer of a breed Yumiko did not know carried them through the streets of New York. Malen rode a snow-white stag, bareback but side-saddle, and Yumiko rode astride a dappled black, with her skirts demurely parted. Despite it being March, these bucks had not yet shed last year’s antlers, but instead had magnificent twelve-point prongs.

  Yumiko had the parcels and boxes of the lady’s purchases bound up and piled between her and the steed’s neck, and she steadied the stack with both hands. The beast she rode had no rein, no bridle, no bit. Malen, cantering ahead, had unbound her hair, so that it fell from her shoulders to the rump of her steed like a scarlet pelisse, and when any people stared or flourished a camera, the strands stirred, and the glamour of the elfin lady spread forgetfulness where she passed. Only one drunk in the gutter and one soapbox preacher wearing a Salvation Army uniform followed the sight of the two deer stalking past and did not blink or have eyes go blank.

  Th
ey entered Central Park from Fifth Avenue, between the pond and the zoo, but as they rode, the trees grew taller, and the city sounds grew more distant. The path underfoot changed, becoming cobblestone, and then a pavement made of luminous crystal that tinkled and hummed under the deer hoofs. By the time they reached Belvedere Castle, it was as immense as the Forbidden City in Peking, and black and silver banners adorned with leafless trees rose from the ninety turrets. Umbrageous silhouettes in silver armor with peaked helms stood watch, but Yumiko’s eyes were prevented from seeing their features, for a shadow hid them. The outdoor theater near the great lawn was larger but also had stands, stalls, and lists for joust and melee as well as a floor for dance and opera.

  The great lawn had grown. Instead of six baseball diamonds, now six great mounds or hills loomed there, with dolmens like stone tables or archways opening into nowhere crowning their green tops. The trees here were taller than any ash, fir, or redwood known to man and soared nine hundred feet into the heavens. Platforms of glass holding cottages made of malachite bricks were in the swaying branches, and larger platforms holding mansions and palaces of emerald, chrysoprase, and green aventurine were nestled to the trunks, and the towers and minarets of these treetop palaces were carven of solid sapphire adorned with blue quartz. The bridges connecting these several outbuildings to the manor houses were ribbons of silk, without handrails.

  Yumiko noticed one eccentricity about the towers growing from the treetops. Each tower top on the side that faced the sun was elongated into a triangular sail which draped like a hood over the balcony, so the tower top resembled a Jack-o’-Pulpit flower.

  Malen, seeing her gaze, turned and called over her shoulder, “Are not the towers of elfland more fair that the skyscrapers of men?”

  “Very fair, milady. Why are they empty?”

  “They are not. Many of the Fair Folk are above us, but your eyes are unfit to see them. Do you know the name of those towers, girl, or why their crowns are shaped like spathe?”

  Yumiko did not know that word, and said, “No, ma’am.”

  “It is in imitation and memory of the cloud towers raised in Heaven by Mulciber before he plunged from the crystal scarp of Heaven in the roaring wake of the route of black angels in their fall. In Sarras, the City of the Grail, the spathe or hood of the tower allows the archangel of the sun to pass by close above the golden streets, but his view of the tower beneath is blocked, and he does not accidentally sanctify mews, dovecotes, bridal chambers, or other tower rooms set aside for profane purposes. The elfs use the same architectural device to shun the gaze of vexed or angry stars, who otherwise would shed an adverse influence. Stars have long memories. But I see you have not heard this lore erenow?”

  “No, milady. This is new.”

  Malen smiled. “Then your imposture is incomplete.”

  “I beg your pardon, ma’am?”

  “The wings of Winged Vengeance come from Sarras. It is where all swan robes and raven cloaks are woven. The vigilante was unknown before Sarras fell, so he clearly knows that walled city, at least well enough to yearn for retaliation against the Seven Lords of Anarchy, who arranged for the overthrow of those fair walls and contrived to bring the Prince of Giants so high into the cloud-lands. The vigilante’s disciple in the fox mask is from that city as well, or was. It is obvious enough who she is.”

  Yumiko asked casually, “Who is she?”

  “What do you care?”

  Yumiko said, “As I have only this day discovered that I was ensorcelled or enchanted to believe I was her, I am naturally curious about who I am impersonating.”

  “During the battle in the Glass Tower, one of the miniature knights of Brian, riding a dragonfly, saw the Foxmaiden raise a bow and shoot and slay a ghost who beset her.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Malen clucked her tongue. “You have no education! Ghosts cannot be touched by arrows flung from any bow of earth. Hence this girl is one who carries the far-famed ghost-slaying bow of Yorimasu, named in song, Hamayumi. Twenty years ago, it was taken by Impetuous Danger Moth to be the bride price for the hand of Dandrenor, the Widow of the White Hands, but after called Dandrenor the Grail Queen. Danger Moth had no son, so who else can avenge the Queen? Who else can find the Grail?”

  Yumiko was electrified. “Then this is her mother? The mother of the Foxmaiden, I mean.” But the grief welling up in Yumiko’s heart was answer clear enough. She almost did not hear what the Red Lady was saying.

  Malen was staring at the sky, her eyes filled with bitterness. “The Grail is the vessel which caught the blood of that drunken Galilean. Now they cannot stop his blood! It is everywhere, in every cathedral! His shed blood should have been our victory! How did it become venom to us, unceasing vexation, an unquenchable fire? We were promised that the Galilean would go into Hell! Promised! The sign of his tortures should have given us power over him. By every proper rule of magic, it must! Why does it give the lesser orders power over us?”

  “Pardon me, my lady. But you were telling me who killed the Grail Queen. Who is responsible for her death?”

  Malen drew her eyes down and cast an indifferent glance at Yumiko. “I care little for the doings of Twilight and hear less, but even I heard of the downfall of the towers of Sarras. I drank a toast when she died. Hail the death of Dandrenor, daughter of Pellinore.” Now Malen favored her with a half-lidded gaze. “You can see why I have an interest in this tale.”

  “No, milady.”

  “Her father is Pellinore! Pellinore son of Pellehan. Pellinore of Listenoise.”

  “I don’t understand, my lady.”

  “Then you are dull of wit, are you not? This usurper rules my ancestral seat. If Listenoise were Chryseis, then Pellinore would be Agamemnon, and my brother would be a baser sort of Achilles, without the good sense to go sulk in his tent.” Malen growled in her throat, her voice made musical with disgust. “Instead, Garlot slays the Arctic giants with gay abandon, fells Iotuns like trees, and places all the Winds of Winter under Erlkoenig’s ambitious scepter! Erlkoenig buys Garlot’s heart with trinkets, the Mantle of Mists, which hides his evil deeds, and the Crystal Cauldron of Youth, to which he flies whenever he is wounded any slightest scratch, the vain boy! He keeps it in a locked treasure chamber whose walls are carven amber, lit by his collection of girls in bottles. But Garlot has done me a good turn at last and visited the pleasure house of my lowborn lover Lucien, as I asked.”

  Yumiko was not interested in this. “Then who slew Dandrenor?”

  But Malen did not hear the question or did not care to answer. “Yes, I am the one who arranged this pass. Soon the City of Corpses will be filled, their number complete! Then, the promise of my mistress, Empousa of Tartarus, will be done, and the Black Spell be torn entirely asunder. It is beginning already. The threads fray! Did you not see the chaos, the glorious chaos? Tumult, riot, and strife? Such is the effect on the kine called mankind when the Black Spell is yanked violently from their brains. Humans are escaping control. What keeps them tranquil grows weak. Reckless hate, vile crimes, and mob violence will become ever more common.”

  “Tell me of this Dandrenor! Who slew her?”

  Malen gave her a withering look. “Should I know? Should any elf? A Giant slew a Moth. One baseborn miscegenation slew another. A trifle. Let dog kill dog!”

  Yumiko licked her lips. “Milady is so wise. She knows much that is hidden. A giant slew Dandrenor, you say? But then why does Winged Vengeance hunt the Anarchists?”

  “Sarras was trampled by the giant Ysbadden, who was sent by the Anarchists, who rose by profane vessels to that high and sacred place. He agreed to seize by force for them the Sangreal, the sacred cup of Him we name not. Ysbadden betrayed them and kept the Grail. The giant dwells in the Third Hemisphere, and it is said no traveler can come upon the giant’s tower except when that traveler is lost. His tower moves like an unanchored ship and is never seen above the same hill twice. That is why they seek the ring the Foxmaiden took. With
out it, the tower of Ysbadden, Caer Nevenhyr, forever eludes them.”

  Malen smiled down at her. “I will guess the riddle of your making,” Malen continued. “The vigilante hired some elf of my generation, in whom the old blood is not diluted, the old fire not dimmed, to make homunculi, or more than one, each thinking herself the Foxmaiden, and skilled with her skills. These he sent into the world in several places, to confound huntsmen and to draw those seeking her astray. That would explain why a grown maiden is but a month old. You look so real! The craftsmanship is skilled! I’ll wager it was Maeve of Orberica or Morgan le Fay.

  “I had no part in the fall of Sarras, but the mischief of the Anarchists pleased me, so I seduced one and arranged an introduction between Lucien Cobweb and the Owl Princess, Lachusa of the Strega. Lachusa is a witch of darkest craft. She introduced him to Empousa of Tartarus. Lucien hired Wilcolac, for whom you dance and flirt and pour.”

  Malen’s laughter was a beautiful silver glissando. She continued: “Your role in Hell’s design is small, but every customer you please earns a reward for the Necromancer. He buys his herbs and essences, rare substances pressed from the glands of the unborn, and calls upon Empousa. So it is arranged that foolish and ambitious pooka-dogs from Elfland become something darker: werewolves of Tartarus to inhabit the bodies of men who slay their own! Each dog, each man, each murderer, each drunk whose downfall you thus aid, is written in a fearsome scroll of judgment no power of earth or underworld can unwrite.”

  Yumiko was so taken aback by the malice in Malen’s eyes, that she forgot her own sorrow and asked, “Then you– you are behind all of this? Why?”

  “To do Erlkoenig, who awarded my lands to another, a hurt from which he will not soon recover.”

  “Then you seek to undo the Black Spell? The Anarchists will keep faith with the Last Crusade and free mankind?”

  Malen turned away. Her stag now stood still. One of the tall green mounds was before her. Malen raised her hand, and a trumpet note from a horn unseen blew dim but clear from below the soil. At once a doorway opened in the mound, and a tongue of ground, grass and all, reached down into the dark, gem-studded depths. A faint melody, but fair to the ear, whispered up from below, and there seemed to be little winking lights in the far distance of the passage sloping into the heart of the hill.