by Clive Barker
‘I knew Mimi better than any of you. As far as I’m concerned we parted only yesterday. I know she guarded the Weave as long as she had breath and wit to do so. Don’t waste her agonies by throwing us into the hands of our enemies just because you get a whiff of freedom in your nostrils.’
‘Easy for you to say,’ Yolande replied.
‘I want to live again as much as you do.’ Romo told her. ‘I stayed here because of my children, thinking – the way we all thought – that we’d be awake in a year or two. Now look. We open our eyes, and the world has changed. My Mimi died an old woman, and it’s the child of her child who stands in her place to tell us that we are as close to extinction as ever. I believe she speaks with Mimi’s blessing. We should listen to her.’
‘What do you advise?’ said Tung.
‘Advise?’ Yolande said. ‘He’s a lion-tamer, why should we listen to his advice?’
‘I suggest we re-weave,’ said Romo, ignoring her outburst. ‘Re-weave before the Cuckoos come amongst us. Then we find somewhere safe, somewhere we can unweave again in our own time, where the Cuckoos won’t be waiting at the border. Yolande’s right,’ he said, looking at her. ‘We can’t hide forever. But facing tomorrow morning in this chaotic state isn’t courage, it’s suicide.’
The speech was neatly argued, and it clearly impressed a good number of the assembly.
And if we do?’ said one of Yolande’s clan. ‘Who guards the carpet?’
‘She does,’ said Romo, looking at Suzanna. ‘She knows the Kingdom better than anyone. And it’s rumoured she’s got access to the menstruum.’
‘Is that true?’ said Tung.
Suzanna nodded. The man took a half step away from her. A swell of comments and questions now rose in the room, many of them directed at Romo. He was having none of them, however.
‘I’ve said all I have to say on the subject,’ he announced, ‘I can’t leave my children waiting any longer.’
With that, he turned and started back the way he’d come. Suzanna pursued him, as the controversy escalated afresh.
‘Romo!’ she called after him.
He stopped, and turned back.
‘Help me,’ she said. ‘Stay with me.’
‘There’s no time,’ he said, ‘I’ve got an appointment to keep, on your grandmother’s behalf.’
‘But there’s so much I don’t understand.’
‘Didn’t Mimi leave you instructions?’ he said.
‘I was too late. By the time I reached her, she couldn’t …’ She stopped. Her throat was tight; she felt the sorrow of losing Mimi rising up in her.’ … couldn’t speak. All she left me was a book.’
‘Then consult that,’ Romo said. ‘She knew best.’
‘It was taken from me,’ Suzanna said.
‘Then you have to get it back. And what answers you don’t find there, put in for yourself.’
This last remark lost Suzanna entirely, but before she could question it Romo spoke again.
‘Look between,’ he said. ‘That’s the best advice I can offer.’
‘Between what?’
Romo frowned. ‘Simply between.’ he said, as though the sense of this was self-evident, ‘I know you’re the equal of it. You’re Mimi’s child.’
He leaned towards her, and kissed her.
‘You have her look,’ he said, his hand trembling against her cheek. She suddenly sensed that his touch was more than friendly; and that she felt something undeniable towards him: something inappropriate between her and her grandmother’s husband. They both stepped back from the touch, startled by their feelings.
He began to walk towards the door, his goodnight delivered with his back to her. She went after him a pace or two, but didn’t try to delay him any longer. He had business, he’d said. As he pushed open the door there was a roar from the darkness and her heart jumped as beasts appeared around him. He was not under attack, however. He’d spoken of children, and here they were. Lions, half a dozen or more, welcoming him with growls, their golden eyes turned up towards him as they jockeyed for the place closest to his side. The door slammed, eclipsing them.
‘They want us to take our leave.’
Jerichau was standing in the passageway behind her. She stared at the closed door for a moment longer, as the sound of the lions faded, then turned to him.
‘Are we being thrown out?’ she asked.
‘No. They just want to debate the problem awhile,’ he said. ‘Without us.’
She nodded.
‘I suggest we walk a little way.’
By the time they opened the door, Romo and the animals had gone; about Mimi’s business.
2
So they walked.
He had his silence; she, hers. So many feelings to try and comprehend. Her thoughts went back to Mimi, and the sacrifice she’d made, knowing Romo, her beautiful lion-tamer, was sleeping in a place she could not trespass. Had she touched the knots where he was concealed, she wondered?; had she knelt and whispered her love for him to the Weave? The very thought of it was beyond bearing. No wonder she’d been so severe, so stoical. She’d stood guard at the paradise gates, alone; unable to breathe a word of what she knew; fearful of dementia, fearful of death.
‘Don’t be afraid,’ Jerichau said at last.
‘I’m not afraid,’ she lied, then, remembering that the colours from her would be contradicting her every word, said: ‘Well … maybe a little. I can’t be a Custodian, Jerichau. I’m not the equal of it.’
They’d emerged from the myrtle copse and walked out into a field. Several huge marble beasts stood in the knee-high grass, their species either mythical or extinct, but either way chiselled in loving detail; tusk and fur and tiny eye. She leaned against the flank of one and stared at the ground. They could hear neither the debate behind them nor the bells in the branches; only night-insects going about their business in the shadow of the beasts.
His gaze was upon her – she felt it – but she couldn’t raise her head to meet it.
‘I think maybe -’ he began, then stopped.
The insects chattered on, mocking his struggle for words.
Again, he tried.
‘I just wanted to say: I know you’re the equal of anything.’
She was going to smile at this courtesy, but:
‘No. That’s not what I wanted to say.’ He took a fresh breath, and with it said: ‘I want to go with you.’
‘With me?’
‘When you go back to the Kingdom. Whether it’s with the carpet or without it, I want to be with you.’
Now she looked up, and his dark face was that of an accused man awaiting verdict; hanging on every flicker of her lash.
She smiled, searching for a response. Finally she said:
‘Of course. Of course. I’d like that.’
‘Yes?’ he gasped. ‘You would?’
The anxiety fled from his face, replaced by a luminous grin.
‘Thank you,’ he said, ‘I want so much that we should be friends.’
Then friends we’ll be.’ she replied.
The stone was chilly against her back; he, in front of her, exuded warmth. And there was she, where Romo had advised her to be: between.
VII
SHADWELL ON HIGH
et me down,’ said the Salesman to his broken-backed mount. They’d climbed a steep-sided hill, the highest Shadwell could find. The view from the top was impressive.
Norris, however, wasn’t much interested in the view. He sat down, labouring for breath, and clutched his one-handed drummer to his chest, leaving Shadwell to stand on the promontory and admire the moon-lit vista spread beneath him.
The journey here had offered a host of extraordinary sights; the occupants of this province, though plainly related to species outside the Fugue, had somehow been coaxed by magic into new forms. How else to explain moths five times the size of his hand, which yowled like mating cats from the tops of the trees? Or the shimmering snakes he’d seen, posing as flames in the nic
he of a rock? Or the bush the thorns of which bled onto its own blossoms?
Such novelties were everywhere. The pitch he’d offered to his clients when tempting them to the Auction had been colourful enough; but it had scarcely begun to evoke the reality. The Fugue was stranger by far than any words of his had suggested; stranger, and more distressing.
That was what he felt, looking down from the hill-top: distress. It had come over him slowly, as they’d journeyed here, beginning like dyspepsia, and escalating to the point where he felt a kind of terror. At first he’d tried not to admit its origins to himself, but such was its force the feeling could now no longer be denied.
It was covetousness that had come to birth in his belly; the one sensation that no true Salesman could ever indulge. He tried to get the better of the ache by viewing the landscape and its contents in strictly commercial terms: how much could he ask for that orchard?; or the islands in that lake?; or the moths? But for once the technique failed him. He looked down over the Fugue and all thought of commerce was swept away.
It was no use to struggle. He had to admit the bitter fact: he’d made a terrible error trying to sell this place.
No price could ever be put on such mind-wracking profusion; no bidder, however wealthy, had the wherewithal to purchase it.
Here he was, looking down on the greatest collection of miracles the world had ever seen, with all ambition to lord it over princes fled.
A new ambition had taken its place. He would be a prince himself. More than a prince.
Here was a country, laid before him. Why should he not be King?
VIII
THE VIRGIN BLOODED
appiness was not a condition Immacolata was much familiar with, but there were places in which she and her sisters felt something close to it. Battlefields at evening, when every breath she drew was somebody else’s last; mortuaries and sepulchres. Anywhere death was, they took their ease; played amongst cadavers, and pick-nicked there.
That was why, when they’d got bored with searching for Shadwell, they came to the Requiem Steps. It was the only place in the Fugue sacred to death. As a child Immacolata had come here day after day to bathe in the sorrow of others. Now her sisters had taken themselves off in search of some unwilling father, and she was here alone, with thoughts so black the night sky was blindingly bright beside them.
She slipped off her shoes, and went down the steps to the black mud at the edge of the river. Here it was the bodies were finally relinquished to the waters. Here the sobs had always been loudest, and faith in the hereafter had trembled in the face of cold fact
It was many, many years since those rituals had been in vogue. The practice of giving the dead to this or any other river had been stopped; too many of the corpses were being found by the Cuckoos. Cremation had taken over as the standard method of disposal, much to Immacolata’s chagrin.
The Steps had dramatized something true, in the way that they descended into mud. Standing there now, with the river moving fast before her, she thought how easy it would be to pitch herself into the flood, and go the way of the dead.
But she would leave too much unfinished business behind. She’d leave the Fugue intact, and her enemies alive. There was no wisdom in that.
No; she had to go on living. To see the Families humiliated; their hopes, like their territories, in dust; their miracles reduced to playthings. Destruction would be altogether too easy for them. It hurt for an instant only, then it was all over. But to see the Seerkind enslaved: that was worth living for.
The roar of the waters soothed her. She grew nostalgic, remembering the bodies she’d seen snatched beneath this tide.
But did she hear another roar, beneath that of the river? She looked up from the murky waters. At the top of the steps was a ramshackle building, little more than a roof supported by columns, in which the lesser mourners had loitered while the final farewells were made at the river-side. She could just see movement there now; fugitives in the shadows. Was it her sisters? She didn’t sense their proximity.
Her unspoken question was answered as she crossed the mud back to the bottom step.
‘I knew you’d be here.’
Immacolata halted, her foot on the step.
‘Of all places … here.’
Immacolata felt a twinge of trepidation. Not because of the man who emerged from the shelter of the column, but because of the company he kept. They moved in the shadows behind him, their panting flanks silken. Lions! He’d come with lions.
‘Oh yes,’ Romo said, seeing the Incantatrix flinch, ‘I’m not alone, like she was. This time you’re the vulnerable one.’
It was true. The lions were unreflective creatures. Her illusions would not mislead them. Nor would her assaults easily touch the tamer, who shared that bestial indifference.
‘Sisters …’ she breathed. ‘Come to me.’
The lions were moving into the moonlight, six in all; three male, three female. Their eyes were glued to their owner, awaiting his instructions.
She took a step backwards. The mud was slick beneath her heel. She almost lost her balance. Where was the Magdalene, and the Hag? She sent another thought in hectic pursuit of them, but fear made it sluggish.
The lions were at the top of the steps now. She didn’t dare take her eyes off them, though she loathed the sight. They were so effortlessly magnificent. Much as the thought appalled her, she knew she would have to flee before them. She would have the menstruum carry her up above the river before they reached her. But it was taking its time to flow through her, distracted as she was. She made an attempt to delay their approach.
‘You shouldn’t trust them …’ she said.
‘The lions?’ said Romo, half-smiling.
‘The Seerkind. They cheated Mimi as they cheated me. They left her in the Kingdom, while they took refuge. They’re cowards and deceivers.’
‘And you? What are you?’
Immacolata felt the menstruum begin to suffuse her shadow-self. With her escape certain, she could afford to tell the truth.
‘I’m nothing,’ she said, her voice now so soft it was almost lost in the din of the river. ‘I’m alive as long as my hatred for them keeps me alive.’
It was almost as if the lions understood this last remark, for they came at her suddenly, leaping down the steps to where she stood.
The menstruum rippled about her; she started to rise. Even as she did so the Magdalene appeared from along the river, and let out a cry.
The call diverted Immacolata’s attention, her feet inches from the mud. It was all that the first of the lions required. He launched himself from the steps towards her, and before she could avoid the attack, he clawed her from the air. She fell backwards into the mud.
Romo pushed his way through the rest of the pride, calling the animal back before Immacolata mustered her powers. The summons came too late. The menstruum was spiralling around the beast, tearing at its face and flanks; the animal could not have disengaged itself now if it had wanted to. But the menstruum’s attack left little in reserve for defence, and the lion landed blow after blow, each gouging a brutal wound. Immacolata shrieked and squirmed in the blood-streaked mud, but the lion would not let her alone.
As its claws opened her face, it let out a throttled roar, and its assault ceased. It stood over Immacolata for an instant, as steam rose from between them; then it staggered sideways. Its abdomen had been opened from throat to testicles. It was not the menstruum’s doing, but that of the knife now dropping from Immacolata’s hand. The beast, trailing its innards, stumbled a little way then keeled over in the mud.
The rest of the animals growled their distress, but held their positions at Romo’s command.
As for Immacolata, the sisters were coming to her aid, but she spat some contemptuous words at them and dragged herself to her knees. The wounds she’d sustained would have left a human being, or indeed most Seerkind, dead in the dirt. Her flesh and upper chest had been traumatically mauled; the flesh hung in
sickening ribbons. Still she hauled herself to her feet, and turned her agonized eyes, which were now set in a single wound, on Romo.
‘I will destroy everything you ever loved …’ she said, her voice throbbing, her hand clutching her face while the blood gushed between her fingers. ‘The Fugue. The Seerkind. All of it! Wiped away. You have my promise. You will weep.’
If it had been in Romo’s power he would have had no compunction about dispatching the Incantatrix on the spot. But delivering Immacolata to pastures new was beyond the power of lion or lion-tamer; weakened as the enemy was, she and her sisters would undoubtedly kill the rest of the animals before they reached her. He would have to be content with what their surprise attack had achieved, and hope that Mimi knew, in her resting place, that her torment had been avenged.
He moved towards the felled lion, speaking soft words. Immacolata made no attempt to harm him, but started up towards the steps, her sisters flanking her.
The lions stood their ground, waiting for the order that would unleash them. But Romo was too busy grieving. He had laid his cheek on the cheek of the dying animal, still murmuring to it. Then the words of comfort stopped, and a look scarcely less than tragic came over his face.
The lions heard his silence, and knew what it signified. They turned their heads to him, and as they did so Immacolata rose into the air, a saint of mud and wounds, the wraith-sisters trailing her like corrupted seraphim.
He looked up as they ascended into darkness, a patter of blood falling. Almost as the night erased them he saw Immacolata’s head loll, and the sisters rise to her aid. This time the Incantatrix did not despise their support, but let them bear her away.
IX
NEVER, AND AGAIN
he ziggurat builder who’d stood guard outside Capra’s House was shouting at them from the edge of the field, courtesy preventing him from coming any closer.
‘They want you back at the House,’ he called.
As they walked back towards the myrtle trees it became apparent that events of some moment were afoot. Members of the Council were already leaving Capra’s House, urgency in their step and on their faces. The bells in the trees were all ringing, though there was no breeze moving, and there were lights above the House, like vast fire-flies.
