by Sarah Rayne
Misrule was urging the Fomoire on, dancing around the watching guests, starting up little chants and rhythms wherever he went. Rumour heard the low murmur of sound begin, and swell, and mount to fill the entire, red-lit hall.
‘Burn the Humanish … Burn them … Burn them …’
The entire banqueting hall was echoing with the rhythmic chanting now.
‘Burn them … Burn them …’
Misrule leapt and capered, laughing and darting, holding out the jutting golden phallus again, and presently, above the steady chanting, Rumour heard another refrain start up.
‘Feed the flames, appease the fire;
Boil the skins and scorch the hair.
Catch the juices, poach the eyes,
Burst the veins and crisp the hides.’
The Fomoire had started it, but now the necromancers were joining in, and the terrible grisly words rose to a painful, deafening pitch.
The guests were swaying with the steady, rhythmic chanting, and Rumour heard the sexual note in their voices. Several of them were pulling up their robes and caressing their swelling organs, and from where she stood, Rumour could see that most of the men possessed the unmistakable barbed penises of all who harness the true Darkness.
A low cry came from the necromancesses, and they pounced at once, their ravaged faces hungry, reaching out, clawing and tearing their gowns aside, exposing withered bodies, empty hanging breasts, fleshless thighs.
They are eaten up with their own hungers, thought Rumour, staring in sick disgust. They are burnt up with their unnatural lusts and desires.
Several of the necromancesses had forced the Dark Lords to the floor, and had leapt to straddle them, forcing the monstrous organs between their thighs, moaning and panting.
Misrule shrieked with delight, and began his capering dance again, and Anarchy flung the wine chalice on to the floor, and plunged into the centre of the heaving, writhing melee.
Murder and the Fomoire had lifted the screaming Humanish prisoner high, and were chaining him to the stake. When they stepped back, the flames from Misrule’s molten pools leapt, engulfing the screaming prisoner, and the truly terrible scent of roasting meat filled the banqueting hall.
From his stance at the far end, the Lord of Chaos stood alone, watching his people as they moaned and writhed in obscene ecstasy. The light from the roasting Humanish burned upwards, making him a creature of dark fire, beautiful and sinister and evil beyond belief. He moved to the back of the dais, and seated himself on a black carven throne, high-backed and lined with ebony velvet. Rumour looked at him, and instantly dragged her eyes away, because even at this distance, he would see that she was not of his people.
The second prisoner was being chained to the next stake now, and his hair had already caught fire, so that the stench of its burning was tainting the hall. The first one was still screaming, but the flames were engulfing his body, and all that was visible of him now was his face, splitting open with the heat, emitting the thin, colourless fluid from just beneath the skin, which ran into the flames with grisly, crackling noises.
Rumour thought: and he will burn slowly, they will all burn slowly, their agony will be long drawn-out, for the necromancers want the light for their repulsive couplings.
As she framed the thought, the Fomoire dragged out the next two prisoners, and Murder again moved into place.
It was then, at the moment when Rumour had been least expecting it, that the Lord of Chaos turned his dark, glowing eyes upon her, and said, ‘Stop. All of you. We have an enemy in our midst.’
*
At once the quality of the revelries altered. The Fomoire scurried backwards, and Misrule and Anarchy turned to regard their Master.
The necromancers and their partners stood up, their robes still disarrayed, some of them partly naked, some of them completely so. From a great distance, Rumour was aware that the first prisoner had sagged on the wooden stake, and that his screams had stopped, but that the second one was still writhing, although his cries were growing weaker.
She moved forward, the thin pale-as-floss gown whispering across the floor as she walked. There was a murmur from the necromancers and the Rodent Captains, and Rumour understood that the agony and the flames had cast over them all a cloak of such unbridled lechery and such rampant hunger that they were still held fast in its grip. Red lust showed in the faces of the necromancers, and also — Rumour shuddered inwardly — in the faces of the females. The Goblin-creatures who attended some of the necromancesses scampered out to her, and tugged on the hem of her gown, chuckling with evil glee as they did so.
Rumour was standing before Chaos now, a little below him, so that he looked down on her. Anger rose within her, and she thought: I may be caught and exposed, but I will not allow this evil creature to look down on me as if I am of no account at all!
With the searing anger came courage, and she walked calmly to stand on the dais beside him and regarded him straightly.
She thought that a gleam of appreciation showed in the dark, glowing eyes, but he only said, ‘You are welcome, madame, even though I think you are unexpected.’
Rumour said, ‘Indeed? Did you not, then, believe I should one day come in answer to your beckoning, Chaos?’ and saw the dark eyes gleam again.
‘You are here in answer to no beckoning of mine, Rumour,’ he said. ‘But since you are here …’ He looked down to where Misrule was listening. ‘Since you are here,’ said Chaos, ‘I believe we shall ask you to provide a little entertainment.’
Rumour stared at him and thought: he is going to burn me! He is going to order Murder and the Fomoire to chain me to one of the stakes, as they have already chained two of their prisoners. And then they will let me burn, and they will continue to satisfy their evil lusts in the light of my burning body! Shall I scream as those poor wretches screamed? She was dimly aware that the second prisoner had sagged into a charred mass, and that his screams had ceased. But before he does that, he is going to force me to spin something for these obscene creatures’ amusement.
Misrule said, ‘Master, she is a Scealai,’ and Rumour heard with disgust the sycophantic note in his voice. ‘I believed her to be one of the guests …’
Chaos did not speak, but he turned on Misrule a look of such searing contempt that Rumour saw Misrule fall back and fling up his hands to shield his eyes. A low murmur came from the listening necromancers, and several of them began to look uneasy.
Chaos turned back to Rumour. ‘You are here to rescue the Amaranth Princess. We both know it.’ He made a brief gesture with one hand. ‘Therefore I cannot allow you to escape,’ he said with a note of what Rumour could almost have believed to be regret. She understood at once that Chaos rather admired her, but that he could not afford to let her live. She must be summarily put to death, here, before all of his subjects, so that they should see his might and his merciless dealings with spies and enemies.
Chaos said, softly, ‘You are right, my dear, of course you must die. But you know, I believe it would add a touch of refinement to your torture to delay it a little.’ His eyes went thoughtfully to the waiting stakes. ‘Not necessarily the flames of course,’ said Chaos, as if considering the matter carefully. There are several other punishments I can order for you.’ The dark eyes hardened suddenly. ‘You should know that I do not care very much for intruders here, Madame Amaranth,’ he said, and now there was no faintly amused respect and no rather grudging admiration. This was premier Lord of the terrible Dark Ireland; the pitiless necromancer who consorted with the darkness and could summon whatever black sorcery he wished.
‘But since you have chosen to risk my anger and my punishment, then let us play the charade a little longer,’ said Chaos. He gestured to the banqueting hall, still lit by the dying flames from the stakes, the breathless anticipation of the guests so strong that Rumour could feel it gusting towards her.
‘It is a pity,’ he said softly, ‘that you did not choose to serve me in other ways, Rumour.’ His eye
s slid over her body and, despite her resolve, Rumour felt the treacherous stirrings again. How would it be, how would it feel to lie alongside this slender, cruel, beautiful being, to see his face twist not with cruel, cold authority, but with passion and longing …
Chaos smiled again, as if perfectly aware of her thoughts. ‘Only think what we could have been together, my dear,’ he said, and now it was the dangerous soft voice of the seducer. He looked at her, and Rumour understood him again. He was offering her her freedom …
If you will bow your head and embrace my dark world …
‘No,’ said Rumour, very softly. ‘I shall never do that, Chaos.’
‘You could share it all,’ he said. ‘The power and the might and the glory.’
‘No,’ said Rumour again, and their eyes met and locked.
Then Chaos said, dismissively, ‘A pity. Misrule was deceived into believing you came here to make part of the entertainments,’ he said. ‘He is a gullible fool and he will pay dearly for his mistake.’ As he spoke, he flung, almost negligently, a sizzling tongue of flame in Misrule’s direction. Misrule screeched with anger and fear, but the flame had reached him, and curled about his waist a thin lash of white-hot fire. Misrule screamed and tore at the fire, his fingers blistering and bubbling from its furious heat, the flesh charring almost instantly. He fell back, rolling over and over in agony now, and Rumour saw with sick horror that the fire-lash that circled his waist was burning through his flesh, cutting him in half …
The necromancers had moved back, their faces uneasy now. Misrule was rolling on the ground, still frantically trying to claw the fire-lash from his body. His nails were black and smoking, and there was a terrible stench of burning. He writhed frantically, screaming arid begging for mercy, but the fire had bitten deep into his flesh now. He arched his back, trying to throw it off, and Rumour saw that blood and bone showed and that the flesh was being neatly sawn through; that there were no jagged-edged wounds, only a clean severing, a slicing in twain.
He knew what was happening. Through the golden mask his eyes were fiery red now, and starting from his head. He threw himself back once again, his head cracking against the hard floor, his body arching once more, so that it rested on the tip of his head and his heels, his neck muscles straining and standing out.
And then, quite suddenly, he looked down at his body, and the watchers saw that the fire-lash had almost succeeded in its grisly work; there was the glint of blood-soaked rib-bones, the dark gleam of liver and the wet purple sac of entrails beginning to spill out over the floor …
Misrule gave one final scream and fell to the floor, blood seeping from the two halves of his body. His hands scrabbled feebly at the ground, as if still trying to reach the dais and plead for forgiveness. His feet in the dazzling, ruby-heeled boots were twitching, as if trying to show that they still had the power to dance and leap.
There was a choking, bubbling cough, and blood — thick dark blood — dribbled from the slits in the golden mask.
Silence fell on the banqueting hall.
‘A fool and a creature of no judgement,’ said Chaos dismissively. And then, to the Fomoire, ‘Remove it.’ The Fomoire leapt at once, dragging the two halves of Misrule’s body across the floor, leaving smeary trails of blood as they did so.
Rumour found herself wondering, with sharp irrelevancy, whether they would use Misrule’s skin, and then, as she felt Chaos’s eyes on her again, turned back to him.
‘And now,’ said Chaos, smiling thinly, ‘now, Rumour, it is your turn to entertain us.’ He moved back to seat himself on the black, velvet-lined throne.
*
Rumour thought: oh, why not do the thing in full? Why not summon up the most dazzling, most extravagant enchantment I can think of? And why not do it with such style and such elegance that it will have these horrid greedy necromancers and these stupid hungering necromancesses speechless with admiration?
And that may give me time to formulate a plan to escape them.
She stepped forward, allowing the front of her gown to slide open a little further as she did so. As she moved, the skirts parted to show the soft gleam of slender thighs and narrow ankles. Rumour moved down from the dais, and walked to the centre of the hall, seeing that Chaos’s guests moved back at once.
She stood at the centre of the great banqueting hall, feeling how thickly it was tainted from the lusts and the greeds of the company, feeling as well that it was smeared and clotted with the bewildered death agonies of the two prisoners, and Misrule’s final, terrible torment, knowing that none of it must matter to her now.
For she must spin something that would dazzle and capture; she must blind these creatures, render them helpless, deaf — lifeless, if only it were possible — so that she could escape and reach Theodora.
For I will not die at these creatures’ hands!
As she lifted her hands to call down the power, her mind was racing. What should it be? Chaos would certainly dissolve at birth anything that would be harmful; he would take a warped delight in watching her try to summon the Enchantment of Slumber, or aggressive spells of knives or fire or lightning that would injure his guests.
Nothing so crude! thought Rumour, turning slowly to regard the waiting necromancers, seeing that anticipation glittered in their eyes, that they were all regarding her with the red lust again. They had already dismissed Chaos’s terrible vengeance on Misrule; they were avid for the revelries again, and it would not take very much to make them tear off the flimsy silk gown and slake their hungers on her helpless body. And although, said a tiny unquenched part of her, although I could cope with the males, I think I must really draw the line at the females and the Rodents!
The sudden wry irony made her feel instantly better. She thought: I am at the centre of Chaos’s Castle; I may well be within yards of Theo and I may be within inches of a nasty death. But for now everyone is looking at me: it is my moment of power, and I must, I absolutely must dazzle them!
The power was there, waiting, shimmering, easily and fluidly obedient to her summons. Whatever she summoned would materialise within seconds. What should it be?
What?
And then a tiny smile curved her lips, and as she looked round at the silent watching necromancers and the Rodent Captains, and at Murder and Anarchy, she thought: well, of course there is only one enchantment I can use! Of course there is only one that will dazzle and bewitch them, and that will show them that I am easily as powerful as they are, and that may even give me the chance to escape!
The beautiful rich spell she had woven herself over so many years, that had never been completed, that never would be completed, because its story would never be told, it had no end …
The glittering, iridescent enchantment that she could conjure so easily, and that would unroll and unfold its immense shimmering pageantry and its brilliant, compelling magic, with pouring rivers of molten gold and silver strands and incandescent blues and greens, and blazing oriflames of scarlet and orange and tawny.
The Unfinished Spell.
The Enchanted Tapestry of the Amaranths.
*
It formed at her bidding almost instantly, and although Rumour was concentrating on keeping the silvered symbols of the Enchantment firmly before her inner eye, she heard the ripple of admiration that went through the hall. She thought: I was right, I was right to suspect they had not so very much power, these creatures! How easy it is to dazzle them!
The stories were spilling over now, beautiful and enthralling and magical; each one a precious piece of history, each one a page of the chronicles of Ireland; of sorcery, of necromancy, of battles and intrigues and usurpings; invasions and Wars and Golden Reigns and Evil Tyrannies … The Wolfkings and the Druids and the sidh, and the strange, half-Human beasts who had ruled from Tara, all pouring out and marching past, whirling about the heads of the Dark Lords with lambent light and flaring colour.
Rumour stood at the centre, the pageantry all about her, glittering and shini
ng, dazzling in a hall that had been dazzling to begin with; a marvellous chiaroscuro, a shifting, blurring kaleidoscope not only of light, but also of elusive sounds and vagrant scents, and the marvellous woodland magic and the deep mountain sorcery, and the glittering intrigue of the Courts of the High Kings. The lovers and the poets and the warrior Queens of Ireland; the fighters and the traitors and the courtiers … The lost loves and the forbidden passions and the strange spells and the lingering curses that ran through Ireland’s great and wonderful history in glittering threads of scarlet and gold, and in coursing rivers of twilit sorcery and dawn-filled magic …
There was unwilling respect in every face now; the necromancers were staring and Chaos was watching from the black throne, his eyes unreadable.
Rumour thought: if there is a moment when I can run from the hall and try to reach Theo, then surely this is the moment! Strength coursed through her, and she thought: this is the moment, now, when they are all dazzled, and when the brilliance is blurring their vision and their senses. She lifted a hand again, causing the pouring swathes of brilliance to spiral upwards, gathering the Enchantment up as she would have gathered up a glittering ball of thread, seeing the tumble of the marvellous tapestry whirling about in a maelstrom of rainbow beauty.
And then she stepped back, and slipped out through the doors of the hall.
Chapter Forty-one
The concubines did not know what to do. They had been waiting for AnCine to return from the banquet, because of course, AnCine had been chosen to attend: they had all known that she would be. But she had promised to tell them all about it, and so they were going to sit up, just as they did when one of them was sent to Chaos, so that they could hear all about it.
She had looked very nice indeed. They had all helped, running to and fro to fetch scented water and oil for her bath and trying the effect of tawny brown — no yellow! — for her gown and cloak. It had all been so exciting.
