The din was deafening.
I watched in wonder at the miracle in front of my eyes.
Old Earth was an abandoned wasteland, yet under this alien sky, between the desert and the polar seas, the glorious Republic of Saint Mark, the Serenissima, the Floating City of Masks, Queen of the Adriatic, Old Lady of the Lagoon, was alive again.
I made my way to the water front, crossing with enormous difficulty the almost solid current of human flesh and, with a good deal of screeching and waving, I finally managed to hail a boat, a small sandolo, not as glamorous as a gondola but sufficient for me and my meager belongings. I gave the boatman the cryptic address of Angela’s NeuVenedian friend, Mr. Lukan Løvensgård, and sat on my cushioned seat while the beauty of the old town unfolded in front of my eyes.
I was deposited on a small elegant landing, on a lesser canal, and directed to a narrow alley, or as the locals called it, calle. There was a painted wooden portal set deep into a tall wall. An ornate doorknocker activated a buzzer somewhere inside. I had hardly banged the knocker once when the portal silently opened, letting me into one of those unexpected hidden courtyards so common in NeuVenedig.
It was a roughly square, cloister-like, quiet space surrounded by window-pierced walls on three sides, with a porch on the fourth and over that a balustrade, and the main door to the house, accessible through the magnificent staircase that climbed up at a corner of the garden. The space in the middle was covered in perfectly swept pale flagstones. Spreading shadow-trees stood in beds dug at three corners, their leathery, purplish, palmate leaves curled tight under the long winter night. Tall desert laurels in carved planters lined the edge of the porch, their sharp, crystal-studded, carmine leaves glittering darkly in the light of the fire-bulbs. A gorgeous sculpted well-head stood in the middle. And nothing else. No pink roses, thank god. Indeed, the unusual light cycle of the NeuVenedian continent made gardening in the town a bit of a special challenge. The sparse local flora had been massively improved and genetically modified in the effort to create suitable garden plants and agricultural crops, and the results were, to say the least, bizarre. I walked across the courtyard and stepped up the staircase, on top of which the ornate door was already open.
A tall, straight, white-masked figure waited patiently just inside it. For a moment I thought it must be my host, but then something in his stance and dress told me he was more probably a butler of some kind, a sort of semi-mythical creature that I hadn’t met very often in my life.
"Hello," I said, approaching with some hesitation. "My name is Ivory Blake. I believe, er, I think Mr. Løvensgård is, er, he knows of my arrival?"
“Of course you are expected, Miss Blake," said the butler, with punctilious emphasis, as if somewhat disgusted by my imprecise command of basic everyday conversation. “Please come in. The maid will show you to the parlor. You may leave your luggage in the hallway.”
He pronounced the last sentence as if the idea of having my plebeian suitcase anywhere else in the house was an offensive prospect. I wondered if I was supposed to shack up in the courtyard, under the porch, or in the entrance. I was somewhat daunted by all this formality and by his mask, a menacing white bauta, the most unfriendly and least attractive of the traditional Carnival masks. However, Lukan Løvensgård was, according to Angela, one of the richest men in NeuVenedig and could hardly be expected to bestir himself to open doors and fetch suitcases for lowly guests of my sort.
The aforementioned maid emerged from the shadows in the corner of the entrance behind the butler, as if she had just walked out of the wall, and she beckoned to me mutely with her hand. She wore a plain black velvet mask without a mouth, a moretta, a mask, as I would afterward discover, held in place with a button held between the wearer’s teeth. I shuddered; the black, lipless face was creepy in the gloom.
I followed through a rather dark corridor with spot-lit artwork exposed in little niches in the walls; the maid walked too quickly for me to take in much detail. Finally I was silently shown into a beautiful hall.
Parlor was not in fact the word I would have chosen to describe the room, given its proportions. It was large enough to serve as a moderate ball room, with smooth pale wooden floors and dark slate-grey walls. The high ceiling, lit by soft hidden lights, seemed to float weightlessly over an extraordinary frieze of spotless white stucco. The architectural beauty of the room was such as to require no other décor, and the few pieces of furniture, a low but chunky crystal table, plain buff leather seats and sofas, a few lamps, were all as sober and unobtrusive as they could be.
Yet I immediately perceived that the room itself was nothing but a frame, a huge decorative frame to set off the largest art screen that I had ever seen in any private house. The sofa I was shown to was placed in front of it, at a perfect distance to appreciate the display. The room was dimly lit, just enough for ambiance and comfort, but it was awash with turquoise light from the screen, which was glowing faintly and seemed to draw the watcher into its watery depth by the sheer intensity of contrast between its vivid colors and its shadowy surroundings.
It was showing a magnificent painting the title of which, “The birth of Venus”, floated holografically in the foreground. A very classical choice of subject, I thought, but the artist had given the old mythical scene quite a new drift.
Instead of standing demurely on an improbable giant shell, covering her juicy bits modestly with her long hair, this Venus was being escorted or, to be precise, carried, through transparent foamy waves by a bevy of handsome mermaids and mermen, whose sinewy scaly tails shone and glittered in shades of teal and green, realistically distorted by the intervening water. Venus´ long auburn hair floated freely just under the surface of the waves, mingling with the sea foam. One mermaid held the apparently sleeping or unconscious Venus in her arms, looking down into her lovely face with the affectionate wonder of a nurse holding a newborn infant. The goddess was, in fact, not that young but still quite a bit younger than Venus was usually depicted, a girl on the very edge of womanhood: her small budding breasts pointed at the dark, stormy sky with tiny, tight, rosy nipples. Her lithe body was contoured by the lapping water, and exquisitely detailed water drops studded her unblemished skin. Another mermaid held up Venus´ left leg, the knee draped over her arm, providentially tipping the supine body of the goddess ever so slightly towards the onlooker. The right leg rested on the shoulder of a merman whose face rose out of the water just inches from the pale, fresh, perfectly bare sex of the sleeping girl. Its lips were impeccable in their lovely symmetry, lapped by sea water and foam; they had the tight fresh perfection of a dewy rose bud just unfolding to the first morning light, still night-cool and spangled with dew drops. The merman seemed to watch entranced; his dark hands lay wide open on the cusp of her lean thighs, stroking their soft skin and framing, as it were, the tender folds of her flesh with his palms and fingers. Only a moment of closer observation revealed that, just over the surface of the water, both his thumbs, side by side, were sunk deep into the girl’s narrow virginal slit. The face of the goddess looked supremely serene, almost blank; a sleeping child, but with the faintest shadow of a smile playing on her coral lips, dimpling ever so lightly her flawless peachy cheeks.
Despite all the drawing and painting of nude bodies I had done in the years at the Academy and since, I felt a blush rising to my face. The picture was so boldly conceived, elegantly composed and perfectly executed that I felt humbled by its mastery. The life size of the figures, the accuracy of the detail, the vividness of the colors, all made me feel as if I was intruding on some real life scene, and heaven knows the subject was provoking enough. Of course I knew that the picture was intended to provoke me, and I was determined not to take the bait, but the truth was that I felt a slick heaviness in my crotch just by staring at it.
That may be why, when a door opened at the far end of the room and steps resounded on the wooden floor, I jumped up with a guilty start, blushing violently. I turned round, feeling absolutely scarlet, wh
ile my host crossed the expanse of parquet in long quick strides and came to stand in front of me with a wide smile.
I was dumbfounded. His fame as an art collector, at least as reported by Angela, was such that I had imagined an ancient, venerable, patriarchal figure. The man in front of me, while not an extremely young man, could hardly have been older than forty or forty-five GSyears.
He was quite tall, slender as a whip, with nice long legs and a mass of very blond hair accurately brushed and tied back with a velvet bow. He wore a half mask of silk-embroidered black velvet edged with tiny jet beads, dark pants, shiny black half boots, and a flamboyant waistcoat, black silk embroidered in silver. His white shirt had puffy sleeves and a high collar, which seemed even higher because of the cravat wound around it, so arranged that not a glimpse of his throat could be seen. His light blue eyes looked almost colorless, framed by the dark mask. His skin was very pale, and he looked every bit as if he had just walked out of an old vampire book, except that his bright smile did not contain any pointy fangs. He wore thin leather gloves, dove grey with pearl white seams.
"Uh..." I said, undecided, "Mr Løvensgård?"
I extended my hand towards him, and he took it, turned it, brought it to his lips and gave it the shortest peck of a kiss. I just stood there blinking, dumbfounded by this completely unexpected way of greeting and by the exquisite softness of his gloves.
"Lukan, please," he said, gesturing to the sofa, were I sat abruptly, operated more by force of gravity than actual intention. His voice was a melodious purr that turned every word into a song.
"Well," he said, "I will have to complain to Angela. She just told me she was sending an artist. She did not say you were so young and so delightful. I have arranged lodgings for you which will grant you some privacy and independence. I regret that now."
He smiled again, and my silly heart fluttered. There, he had talked to me for less than thirty seconds, made me some insipid compliments, and I was already sold. Admittedly, I hadn't had a lover in a while. I had been too busy painting flowers and butterflies.
"I was not supposed to be here, actually," I said, trying to establish a professional tone in our exchange and failing. "There was another illustrator, but there was an accident, she told me, so she sent me instead."
"Well, what a blessed accident," he said, smiling. "Listen, my dear, if you are not very tired I will offer you lunch, walk you to your lodgings and show you the sights on the way. NeuVenedig is not large, but it’s amazingly easy to get lost. There are signs everywhere, but strangers just find them confusing. I am sorry about that. We are not assholes; it's just that this town is a mess. A delightful mess, of course."
He smiled at me again, and I nodded; to what exactly, I did not know. Just to his voice, probably. When he stood up and gestured me to follow him, I did so as meekly as a hypnotized lamb.
"Don't worry about your luggage," he said while walking out in the courtyard, after having picked up a coat and a walking cane, which he absolutely didn’t need. "You will find it waiting for you, unless you prefer to go by boat yourself of course. D-Passages can be exhausting, I realize that."
I hurried up behind him, squealing something to the general effect that I was perfectly rested and ready to go and do anything. He grinned, a cold, cynical and yet weirdly irresistible grin that left me melting behind my black half mask. Who is this guy? I thought. And how did Angela ever get involved with him?
In the next two hours, in a small, curiously old fashioned restaurant obviously not on the map of the reveling masses, I was fed like a princess on fried soft shelled crabs and steamed mussels, with dry, chilled white wine, smoked lamb and baby artichokes, with a robust red, and a delicious lemon sherbet steeped in vodka that, after the trip, the walk and the wine, left me half stunned but strangely happy. I was feeling dangerously light-headed when we left the restaurant, and it took me the entire walk to San Marco before the fumes of alcohol evaporated enough for me to look around.
The ancient majestic Piazza on the edge of the lagoon was a sea of revelers. Here were the most imposing costumes I had seen in the town. Human figures made huge by vast winged cloaks, tall head-dresses and fabulous feathery crowns seemed to sail over the packed crowds like black swans. But in truth nobody was sailing anywhere, because the throng was too packed even to walk. Crawling sideways through the press was all anyone could do. The quayside was alight with lanterns and shining fairy lights, and the moored galleys were all alive with parties on the decks. Here everyone wore masks, though not everyone wore clothes, but mostly they still had the good sense to keep their cloaks on against the chilly wind. I suspected that this might change later, at night.
We pushed our way over the worst of the crowd which was more or less stationed in the older part of the harbor and finally made it over the Ponte della Paglia, where the press seemed to be a bit thinner. On top of the bridge Lukan, who had been silent in the Piazza, where the din was simply too great for talking, gestured back towards San Marco.
“You must come in the morning if you want to see the palace and the cathedral. Hopeless after twelve.”
I nodded. He was fastidiously pulling back some locks of hair that had gone astray during the passage of the square and adjusting the embroidered wrists of his coat. He gave a vague wave towards the Bridge of Sighs, the Columns of San Marco and San Teodoro and the Campanile, clearly assuming that I knew already what was what and that there wasn’t any need to explain anything. He was only half right. I had hardly had time to really study maps and guides of NeuVenedig, and for the time being I was just lost in the general beauty of the place, unable to tell one magnificent building from the next.
As for him, he looked down a bit disgusted on the crowd in the Piazzetta. Later on I would learn he was mostly disgusted by having been squeezed, handled and fondled by half the revelers we had crossed on the way. Even in a mask and cloak his blond hair, elegant figure and pale eyes attracted quite a bit of attention, and he was a conspicuous target for many a roving hand in the crowd. I didn’t know at the time that it was quite a rare occurrence for him to cross San Marco during the height of the Carnival. The long walk along the Riva degli Schiavoni was easier; the crowd dwindled almost to nothing by the time we passed by the Arsenal, and the paved waterfront was empty when we reached the yacht quay. The solar yachts were a far more somber apparition than the galleys. Squatting silently under their solar shields, useless in this season, they waited for summer and the endless sunny day of NeuVenedig. Lukan walked up to a particular boat, which was moored far out towards the public gardens, almost at the eastern limit of the city. She was not very large, but not one of the smaller craft either. She looked like a true ship, at a time when yachts were often built to resemble something else: primitive rafts, sea animals, coral islands. This boat had a long, slender hull, black, with a long white stripe running its whole length, and golden scrollwork at the two ends. She had a luxurious yet rakish, fast look about her, like an old-fashioned clipper ship.
Lukan gave a crisp vocal command. “Alhambra, plank!” A gangplank shot out of the side towards the pier. He gestured me to follow him, and I stepped in awe on board the beautiful boat.
“This is mine. I don’t use it in winter obviously, but it should be comfortable enough for you, if you don’t mind the walk. You can always take a gondola to get home, if it’s too far. At least it’s quiet here. Sometimes I feel like moving in myself at this time of the year.”
He showed me around until I was speechless with wonder that I could spend six weeks in such spectacular accommodations. It was better than any luxury hotel, and indeed more private than the most private guest room.
“You must make yourself at home, Ivory, empty the galley, use the bar, the sauna, anything you need.” He waved his hand around absent-mindedly. “This is the Carnival. Feel free to bring guests.” He winked at me.
“Oh, and one last thing!” he said, on the way out. “I have a young friend, a girl about your age, whom you should me
et. She will be delighted to show you around. She’s better company than I am. I will see that you two get together tomorrow or the day after, as soon as you are settled in. Have a good night’s sleep now. You’ll need to be rested before tasting the Carnival.”
He gave me a mischievous grin, kissed my hand, and with a last bow and flourish of his silver-headed walking cane, he walked out into the night.
End of sample chapter
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Series Order:
Black Carnival
White Sands
Head-Shy
Hell’s Mercy
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