Dancer's Illusion

by Ann Maxwell

  But her eyes itched even as the words formed on her tongue.

  “Then what should I do?” she hissed beneath her breath to the Itch behind her eyes. “Tie the snake in a knot?”

  The itching faded. She had the clear feeling that it was not an answer, merely a temporary erasure so that she would be able to feel new messages written on the back of her eyes.

  Kirtn tugged gently at her hand. His eyes were fixed on the silver-blue glow ahead. Clearly he was impatient with the slidewalk’s leisurely pace. She, on the other hand, would have been glad never to get where the slidewalk was taking her.

  She looked over her shoulder and felt her lines flare. She would have to go forward, because two steps behind her was nothing at all, not even the slidewalk’s pearl shimmer. It was as though the world ended. The veil itself had vanished as completely as though it had never existed. She could not even sense its penetrating, dissonant energies.

  With a feeling close to despair, she turned from the emptiness behind her to the unwelcome radiance ahead. Shapes were condensing out of the glow, curves of flashing light, crystal geometries rising plane after plane, all bathed in a subliminal humming of emotions neither demonic nor divine, yet somehow more compelling than either or both together.

  From her hair a Fssireeme sang of beauty in a chorus of Bre’n voices. She looked at Kirtn, afraid that he would be swept out of her reach into the Stones’ crystal embrace.

  “I’m here,” he murmured, smiling down at her. “But hold on to me. If the Stones don’t get me that silver-tongued snake will.”

  The slidewalk increased its pace until her hair was whipped by wind. Abruptly, she regretted not jumping off while she could. She looked at her Bre’n. Lines of strain were etched on his face. As though at a great distance, she sensed something calling to him, something inhuman and superb, devastating perfection.

  “Kirtn?” she asked softly.

  “Nothing.” His voice was curt. Then he shrugged. “The Stones. They’re unspeakably beautiful, but I like to choose my lovers—or my gods.”

  “Fight them.”

  “I am.” Silence. Then, almost wistfully, “Don’t you feel them, dancer?”

  She said nothing, for she had finally seen the slidewalk’s destination. Her fingers clamped around his wrist harshly enough to draw a grimace even from a Bre’n. Just ahead, the shining ribbon they rode ended in a burst of pearl light. A figure stood waiting for them, dark within the radiance that was endemic to the Redis territory.

  The slidewalk stopped so suddenly that Bre’n and Senyas were thrown off their feet. They scrambled upright—and found themselves looking into f’lTiri’s triumphant smile.

  A million hot needles dug into the back of Rheba’s eyes.

  XIX

  “F’lTiri?” asked Rheba, happiness and uncertainty mingling in her voice.

  “Of course,” said f’lTiri, laughing as he reached for his friends.

  His hands were warm and firm as they clasped first Kirtn’s arm and then Rheba’s hand. The voice was the same, the lips, the laugh . . . but she would have felt better if she had never heard of class twelve illusions. Even so, she smiled and returned f’lTiri’s greeting, for she very much wanted it to be him.

  Her eyes itched savagely. Something inhuman began singing deep in her mind. Hastily she let go of f’lTiri. The singing, if not the itching, stopped.

  “Where’s i’sNara?” she asked, clutching Kirtn’s wrist as though he would run away despite his previous assurances.

  “With the children,” answered f’lTiri. His smile was happiness condensed into a single curving line. “We were so wrong about the Ecstasy Stones. They’re . . .” F’lTiri groped for explanations that did not exist in the Yhelle language.

  Rheba’s lines ran hot, then icy, for f’lTiri was speaking Yhelle instead of Universal. Fssa was translating automatically, inconspicuously, so that she could understand f’lTiri.

  But before this moment, f’lTiri had never spoken anything except Universal to them.

  “The Stones are so wonderful,” sighed f’lTiri. “Come. I’ll take you to them.”

  Rheba did not need the torment behind her eyes to know that something was more or less than it seemed. Was f’lTiri the unwilling—or even willing—captive of Ecstasy, or was he a class twelve illusion from sweet smile to dusty sandals? She stared into his eyes, looking for answers. She saw nothing except her own fiery reflection. It startled her, for she had not realized that she was burning.

  “Dancer?” murmured Kirtn in Senyas. Then he added a Bre’n trill that asked why she burned when there was no danger near.

  She looked at f’lTiri and said only, “We’re not ready to see the Stones yet. We were trying to get back to our ship when the veil brought us here.”

  Not quite the whole truth, but enough for her purposes.

  F’lTiri smiled again, redefining joy in a single gesture. Rheba stared, fascinated. Even the boy she had known as The Luck had not smiled quite so perfectly, and he had been the culmination of Cycles of genetic selection for charm and good fortune. But The Luck’s sweet surface had been only half of his unique truth. She suspected that it was the same with f’lTiri.

  She looked away from his compelling smile. Her lines burned hotly, fed by fear and the energy that pervaded everything with a blue-white glow.

  “Oh, the veil,” said f’lTiri, dismissing it with a twinkle of his illusionist eyes. “It gets independent every now and again. We’re illusionists, not engineers, and the veil construct is many Cycles old. It always works again, though, if you give it enough time. Unless there’s something urgent at the ship for you to attend to . . .?”

  She looked at Kirtn. He said nothing. His face was hard, his eyes narrow within their golden mask. She could sense the conflicting energies within him, her own and f’lTiri’s racing along sensitive Bre’n nerves, competing for his attention.

  Casually, as though it were an oversight, she let flames leap from the hand nearer f’lTiri. After a momentary hesitation, f’lTiri jerked his fingers away from Kirtn’s arm. She sensed the conflict within her Bre’n diminish. With a smile of her own, she faced the Yhelle illusionist.

  “Now that you, i’sNara and your children are safe, Kirtn and I have to get back to the ship.” Rheba’s words sounded unconvincing, even to her. “There are other Loo slaves on board the Devalon,” she added quickly, “other promises to keep. They’re as eager to see their homes again as you were to see yours. Or,” she added, thinning her smile to a bare line of teeth, “more eager. You were reluctant to come home again. Remember?”

  F’lTiri’s smile shifted, then resettled into indulgent lines. “I’sNara and I were very foolish.”

  “The veil,” reminded Rheba gently. “Fix it for us.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Is that the way the Tyrant keeps his subjects in place?” asked Rheba.

  F’lTiri’s smile widened. “K’Masei isn’t a tyrant. He’s just impervious to love.”

  She smiled sardonically. “That’s as good a definition of a tyrant as I’ve heard.”

  “No tyranny, just ecstasy,” murmured f’lTiri dreamily. “You must see the Stones, Rheba. They are . . .” His voice dissolved into another incredible smile.

  She turned away from him. As she looked over her shoulder she realized that the slidewalk was gone. Where its pearl ribbon had once been there was nothing at all, not even a small glow. She closed her eyes and tried to sense the direction of the nearest coil of veil. All she found was energy pouring out of the radiant center of the Redis hall—if those crystal curves could indeed be called something so mundane as a clan hall.

  Deliberately, she tried to touch the core of whatever powered the hall. It was like trying to hold an oiled ball on her fingertip; whenever she approached a balance point, the ball would slide away. She could only drink the source of energy indirectly, like taking light reflected off another surface instead of going directly to the luminous core. Perhaps if she were clo
ser to the source she could tap it more directly.

  At least her eyes had stopped itching while she tried.

  “Ready?” asked Kirtn, when he saw her attention return to the moment.

  “Ready for what?”

  “The tour.”

  “What tour?”

  “The one f’lTiri is going to give us,” said the Bre’n patiently.

  She looked at f’lTiri. Her eyes itched terribly. She looked at her Bre’n. The itching abated but did not go away. She frowned and sent dancer energy coursing through Kirtn, trying to chase the confusion she sensed beneath his benevolent smile.

  F’lTiri made a small sound and stepped back from Kirtn. Only then did Rheba realize that the illusionist had been touching Kirtn’s arm. The unexpected surge of akhenet energy must have scorched the illusionist’s fingers.

  Kirtn moved as though walking out of deep water. He focused on the dancer eyes staring up at him. He whistled a slow apology. “They’re strong, Rheba. Each time I close one door they find a new one to open. But they can’t get around your energy. Burn for me, dancer. Burn for both of us.”

  “And the tour f’lTiri is going to give us?” she whistled, letting the minor key and her touch tell him that she would burn for him beyond the ice at the end of time. “Do we go with him like slaves broken to the training lead?”

  His mouth turned down at her reminder of the Loo-chim’s razor leash. Were it not for the zoolipt’s mindless healing, he would have worn a collar of scars for the rest of his life. “No razor restraints here. Just . . .” His voice died. He could not describe the temptations of Ecstasy.

  Her mouth echoed the bitter curve of his lips. She heard his thoughts as clearly as she had heard his whistle. “Be grateful I can’t hear their call. If I could, we’d be up to our cracks in ice and ashes.”

  “Are you ready?” asked f’lTiri serenely.

  “No, I’m not ready to see the Ecstasy Stones.” Rheba’s voice was as clear and hot as the flames licking over her akhenet lines.

  And then her voice broke, for the ground had changed beneath her feet. The distant building composed of radiance and crystal arcs loomed in front of her now. A scarlet slit opened in the lowest curve of wall.

  “No,” she said, pulling back.

  F’lTiri stood patiently. “I’m not taking you to the Stones,” he murmured. “Just a tour of k’Masei’s hall. Then, if you still don’t want to know Ecstasy, I’ll take you back to the veil. The Stones don’t force,” he added softly. “That’s not their way.”

  Rheba glanced sideways at her Bre’n’s strained face and had to bite her lip to keep from answering. A coolness behind her eyes rewarded both her restraint and her conclusion about the Ecstasy Stones’ gentleness. Having Itch’s agreement was a two-sided weapon, though; she was not sure just whose interests Itch had at heart—assuming Itch had something that passed for a heart.

  “Well, Itch” she whispered beneath her breath, “should I go or stay?”

  There was a mixed flash of itch-cool.

  “No tour?” breathed Rheba. She grabbed her eyes. “All right,” she hissed. “I’m going!”

  Coolness and a distant breath of apology.

  Grimly, Rheba tightened her grip on Kirtn’s arm. He smiled despite the pain of her hand grinding flesh against bone. He shifted so that their fingers interlaced in an unbreakable clasp.

  She looked at the man who might once have been f’lTiri. “Make it a short tour. I’ve already seen enough of Yhelle to last me until I die.”

  F’lTiri smiled and turned. As he did, the crystal hall shifted and reformed around them. The Redis, unlike the Yaocoons, apparently believed in advanced machinery. She sensed speed and movement and wild rush of energy nearby. Her hair rippled, questing outward in blind, precise seeking, tendrils reaching for the power that leaped endlessly around her.

  Kirtn whistled and clenched her fingers until they ached. “Dancer,” he whistled, off-key in his urgency, “the Stones are much closer now. They may not be coercive, but in the name of Fire they’re addictive! Burn!”

  She loosed a torrent of energy through him, scourging his nerves and purging his mind. He staggered, caught himself and held her fiercely against his sweating body. Rainbow’s hard facets cut across her cheek, but she did not complain, simply held on and burned.

  F’lTiri watched, smiling with blind affection. For the first time Rheba saw that his eyes were white.

  Fssa shifted beneath her seething mass of hair. Though she could not see him, she knew the snake was changing shapes as rapidly as a thought, tasting the various wavelengths that pervaded the hall. She hoped he could understand them better than she could. The sleeting variety of energies was enough to make her dizzy. Only one was familiar, the dissonant cry of the core that powered the veil.

  “Find anything, snake?” she whistled.

  “Ssimmi is in here . . . somewhere . . . where?”

  The Fssireeme’s longing whistle squeezed her heart. He had mourned his lost home far longer than she had been alive. Nor did she have any way to take him home. Ssimmi was not known to any of the navtrices she had queried. The snake’s planet was lost somewhere among the galaxy’s billion stars.

  If Fssa could find Ssimmi’s equivalent on Yhelle, who was she to tell him it was merely an illusion?

  “Is there anything else here?” she asked softly. “Is the hall an illusion?”

  The snake sighed and retreated into her hair. “Yes, but what’s beneath it is no different.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Neither do I,” whistled the snake plaintively. “There are crystal walls and floors and halls and all, but not where we see them.”

  “Could you find our way back out of here?”

  “I . . .” The snake changed again, tugging gently at her flying hair. “No,” sadly. Then, “But it’s so very beautiful here, dancer. Why do you want to go back?”

  “Are there other ways out of here?” she asked, ignoring his question.

  The snake’s most human sigh slid past her ear. “Stripped of illusion, this place is a maze of light and competing energies.”

  She glanced aside at Kirtn, wondering how he was holding up in his struggle against the seductive Ecstasy Stones. His face was hard and closed as a fist. If she had not been touching him, she would have thought he had no feelings at all. But she was touching him. His conflicting desires raced over her with a discordance that was like passing through the veil again and again.

  Rainbow shone like a double string of molten crystal. It seemed impossible that the Zaarain construct could glow so hotly and not burst into white flames.

  “Are you ready to see the Ecstasy Stones?” asked f’lTiri, his voice as white as his eyes, as white as the hall and the floor, the blinding maze closing around Bre’n and Senyas and Fssireeme alike.

  “No,” said Rheba, striving to make her voice calm.

  “There’s nothing to fear,” smiled the illusionist, voice and words a single curve of light. “Ecstasy doesn’t hurt you.”

  He leaned forward. As his fingers brushed Kirtn’s arm, conflicting currents of energy raced through the Bre’n, numbing him and shocking his dancer. For an instant their interlaced fingers loosened.

  The air around Rheba crackled harmlessly, but it was not so easy for Kirtn. Ecstasy pounded him like a mountain storm, all but shattering him. He staggered against her, renewing their contact once again. He clung to her with hands that were too weak to belong to a Bre’n.

  F’lTiri laughed gently, ignoring Rheba, looking only at Kirtn. “Be like the sea grass, my strong friend. Bend to the waves. Only rocks break.”

  Fire leaped from Rheba, an immaterial whip meant to scorch rather than injure, for she was still not certain whether F’lTiri or an illusion talked to her.

  “We’ve seen enough,” she said harshly. “Take us out of here.”

  White eyes turned and regarded her with blind intensity. Her lines went cold, then leaped. If this had once be
en f’lTiri, it was not her friend now.

  Dancer fire swept out, caging f’lTiri as she had caged the worry stones. He cried out, writhing. Nondancer energies sparked and spat around him, trying to sustain patterns her fire had disrupted. F’lTiri’s appearance melted and ran like mercury, eyes white in a shapeless puddle of gray.

  “Take us out of here!” demanded Rheba, speaking more to whoever controlled the Ecstasy Stones than to the apparition that could have been f’lTiri.

  Walls became mirrors and glided inward, shrinking as floor and ceiling shrank, closing in on her, trying to burn her with her own reflected fire. It was a mistake, like throwing fuel on a raging fire. She took the reflected energy and wove it back into her dance, strengthening the immaterial cage around the illusionist.

  He screamed and changed before her eyes, f’lTiri again, then i’sNara, then a boy with i’sNara’s eyes and a half-grown girl with f’lTiri’s smile. She did not need to know their names to recognize the illusionists’ children. Then he became more people in dizzying succession, Yhelle after Yhelle with no distinction as to sex or age, an agonized throng caught in one quicksilver illusion, flickering in and out of being like a flame in a wind.

  And each illusion wept to be free.

  “Let us go!” screamed Rheba, backing away from the plastic entreaties.

  Hot shards of ecstasy probed her, looking for weaknesses in her akhenet lines. She screamed again. Flames exploded around her and the multifaced illusion. She burned bright and pure, pouring power into the cage of energy she was weaving around what had once worn the appearance of f’lTiri. As the network of fire thickened, the cries faded to whimpers.

  Silence came as the cage imploded.

  When Rheba was no longer blinded by the flames in her eyes, she saw an unknown illusionist dead at her feet. Whoever had died, at least she had not killed f’lTiri. She shuddered, glad that she did not know the man.

  In a last spasm of death, his slack hand opened. A caged crystal rolled free. It burned so savagely that the dancer energies restraining it looked dark by comparison. Rheba stared, puzzled by the too-dark dancer fire before she realized that she had inadvertently caged an Ecstasy Stone.