The Ammonite Violin & Others

by Kiernan, Caitlín R

  And then I open my eyes, open them wide, because I don’t need to see whatever the raven knows will happen next, and because my fox boy’s tongue is magic and I’m coming so hard I think this might finally be the day and the second and the place that my heart stops beating, and the wasps and bees will be happy to know they have my head all to themselves. Now there’s only the smoky room again and my hands tangled in his hair, only the animal masks and the sounds of men laughing and fucking and doing god knows what else to one another. He looks up at me, the fox boy who isn’t me, and wipes his lips and smiles.

  “Is that better, kitsune?”

  “How about we both get the hell out of here?” I ask him, needing another drink so bad it hurts, not even sure where the last one went.

  “Oh, no,” he says, standing and dusting off the front of his gown. “We can’t do that. That’s not the way it works. No one leaves before the show. No one. Anyway, all the doors are locked from the outside. The windows, too. Didn’t they tell you?”

  “You’re shitting me.”

  “No, kitsune. I’m not into that.”

  One of the bulldogs shows up then, this time with shot glasses of tequila and lime, and again I take two. Maybe, I think, there was more to the kitty flips than ecstasy and ket, maybe a dash of LSD, just to spice things up. Maybe more than a dash.

  “Anyway,” my fox boy says, turning towards the stage. “It’s about to begin.”

  “What’s about to begin?” and I toss back one of the tequilas before he can answer me.

  “The changing of the guard,” he says in a tone that is only slightly exasperated, only vaguely condescending, and he sits back down on the sofa and kisses me. He tastes like lipstick and semen and alcohol. And I realize that there’s not so much noise as before, and almost everyone’s turning towards the stage and the golden throne. There are black candles lit now, set out all around the edges of the dais, dozens of them, and on either side of the throne stands a nude man with a purple blindfold tied about his face. Each of the men swings a smoking censer suspended from chains. I want to ask why they’re blindfolded, these men, why blindfolds instead of masks, but know my fox boy would roll his eyes at my ignorance, so I settle for the second tequila, instead.

  “Like Mardi Gras,” I mutter, speaking to no one but myself, perhaps believing I’d not actually spoken at all, and my fox boy sighs and shakes his head, but keeps his eyes on the stage.

  “No, it’s not like Mardi Gras,” he says.

  “I bet you it fucking is,” I tell him, because both the shot glasses are empty and he’s already disgusted with me again, so what the hell have I got to lose?

  “It’s not like that at all. You’ll see.”

  “Ye Mistick Krewe of Comus,” I say and lay my head on his shoulder, wanting to shut my eyes, wishing there would only be darkness if I did—not the wasps, not the staring raven on my window-sill, not the grinning mink boy creeping across my bedroom floor. “Endymion, Rex, Bacchus, Orpheus. The King of fucking Carnival. I’ve been to New Orleans.”

  “I’m sure you have, kitsune. Now shut up and watch.”

  “The goddamn Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club. I know exactly what’s going on here, what all these queer old fucks are up to with their hokey-ass rituals and boy toys.” But I’m not even fooling myself, and I have no idea what these dry old men with bird faces have set in motion. All of them rich and untouchable and stranded way out there in the cruel wastes of December, perched on the high-voltage wires strung across the end of the year, the end of life, and staring greedily, jealously back past crackling autumn leaves and Persian rugs and pretty fox boys to all those long-lost Junes and Julys.

  “You give great head,” I say, and my fox boy laughs.

  Now the blindfolded men have been joined by a very tall ginger-skinned woman in a mask of peacock feathers. I’m about to tell my fox boy that I didn’t think women were allowed. But then I see her dick, so never mind those perfect breasts and brown nipples and the yellow-brown curves of her hips and belly and legs. A she-male or some other transgendered creature, and maybe this will start to make sense in another minute or two, but I doubt it. There’s a crimson jewel like a liquid drop of ruby poured into her navel and a belt of gold coins jingling about her waist, silver bracelets about her wrists and ankles, and around her throat a necklace of bleached white bones. She’s too far away for me to guess what the bones might have come from. She bows to the crowd, and the crowd applauds.

  “Okay,” I say. “I will admit I didn’t see that one coming.”

  “She is the Lady Salome,” my fox boy says; his green eyes sparkle, and I think I might have heard a scrap of something like reverence in his voice.

  “Well, in case you haven’t noticed, she’s got an even bigger shlong than that mink son of a bitch.”

  “You’re physically incapable of shutting up, aren’t you?” my fox boy asks, and I don’t bother to answer him. I look around for one of the bulldogs, but they all seem to have vanished.

  “She’s the daughter of King Herod,” my fox boy says, and I’m straining to think through the fog of booze and drugs and wasps and crackling leaves, trying to figure out what the hell any of this has to do with the dry old men and their King of Birds, when the Lady Salome is joined by Old Man Raven himself. He wears an elaborate golden crown, and I think the crown must be meant to be the sun, that somehow Old Man Raven has climbed into the heavens and managed to pull down the sun so that this night might go on forever, and we will always be locked in here with him, his private, pretend menagerie. He wears a long purple robe over his tuxedo, purple to hide his feathers the way purple hides the eyes of the men at either side of the throne. He bows to Salome, and there’s more drunken applause.

  “Fucking Mardi Gras bullshit,” I hear myself say, my words seeming to reach me from far, far away. I’m still resting my head on the shoulder of my fox boy, even though I’d have a better view if I sat up straight.

  “No, but soon you’ll see,” my fox boy replies.

  But I’m losing interest and thinking about my cock in his mouth, thinking maybe I should be a gentleman and return the favor, when everyone crowded into the loft—all the pets and the dry old men and even my fox boy—begins booing loudly. Some of them are cursing and shaking their fists at the ceiling, so I sit up to see for myself, tired of trading my questions for scowls. And I see that now a very muscular man in a leopard mask, dressed like a Roman centurion, is leading an emaciated, bearded man clothed only in rags roughly towards the stage. The bearded man’s hands are bound behind his back, and his legs are cuffed, as well. He wears no mask at all.

  “That is Jokanaan, the Prophet,” my fox boy says, pointing towards the stage. “He is being brought before Lady Salome and the King by Naaman, the executioner. This is the night of his judgment.”

  “You want me to Mow you?” I ask him, already growing bored again and hoping maybe we can slip away together, find some unoccupied corner or closet or something of the sort, and leave the rest to their theatrics. But my fox boy only shakes his head and shushes me. He isn’t going anywhere, not until it’s over and done with, whatever it might be, and I wish once more that I wasn’t so fucked up and it was safe to just shut my eyes and wait for all this pomp and fucking circumstance to pass me by “Do not talk,” my fox boy whispers through clenched teeth. “It will not be much longer now.”

  The she-male or transsexual or whatever it might be—Salome, the woman in the mask of peacock feathers—takes a sudden, eager step towards the bearded man. He keeps his eyes on the floor, or his feet, or both.

  “Jokanaan!” cries out the Lady Salome, and the booing and catcalls die away as suddenly as they began.

  “Who speaketh?” asks the bearded man in rags.

  “I am amorous of thy body, Jokanaan. Let me touch thy body!”

  “Back, daughter of Sodom!” growls the ragged man, coming abruptly to life now, and I don’t care, only want to taste my fox boy’s lips again and find a bulldog w
ith a sterling silver tray of martinis. But he’s watching the show, my scarecrow bundled from autumn leaves and carpet scraps and stuffed into that fox-faced countenance and that immense, rustling gown.

  “Touch me not!” howls the prophet. “Profane not the temple of the Lord God.”

  “Speak again, Jokanaan. Thy voice is wine to me!”

  “Oscar Wilde,” I sigh, and my fox boy looks away from the stage long enough to glare at me. I think his eyes are green berries not yet ripened, something that will turn red, then black, something for the beaks of the dry old men to pluck out and devour.

  “ What?” he asks, sounding genuinely angry now for the first time. “What are you talking about?”

  “You know. It’s Oscar Wilde. But it’s all out of order. And where’s Herodias and the young Syrian? They should both be in this scene, I think.”

  He’s still glaring at me, those green berry eyes, those eyes I might like to taste myself—sour, but with some promise of sweetness yet to come.

  “I’ll find you later,” he says coldly. “Maybe. Maybe I’ll find you later.” And then he’s up off the sofa and disappearing into the smoke and the crowd before I can stop him, before I can say no, I’m sorry, don’t leave me all alone in this place. And as he goes, I see there’s a hole cut neatly into the back of his dress for two fox tails, luxurious tawny fur tipped with warning dabs of white and grown so long and bushy that they almost drag the floor behind him. And it’s only the drugs that make them twitch and wag like living things. Only the drugs, the X and ketamine, the liquor and pot and whatever clandestine substances I might have unwittingly ingested, and nothing more. Nothing more at all. I let him go. I do not follow. I’ll find him later, I tell myself, when this shit’s over, and I’ll make nice and apologize.

  “Who is this woman who is looking at me?” asks the ragged man in chains. “I will not have her look at me. Wherefore doth she look at me, with her golden eyes, under her gilded eyelids? I know not who she is. I do not desire to know who she is. Bid her begone. It is not to her that I would speak.”

  “I am Salome, daughter of Herodias, Princess of Judæa.”

  And now the Lady Salome takes another step towards the cringing prophet. I glance from the stage to the crowd, hoping for some glimpse of my vanished fox boy. But there are only minks and tigers and lynxes, rabbits and toads and a hedgehog or two.

  “Speak again, Jokanaan,” purrs Salome. “Thy voice is as music to mine ear.”

  “Daughter of Sodom,” the prophet moans and tries to pull free of the executioner’s grip. “Come not near me! But cover thy face with a veil, and scatter ashes upon thine head, and get thee to the desert, and seek out the Son of Man.”

  “Who is he, this Son of Man?” asks the Lady Salome, standing so close now to the bearded man that her breasts brush against him. “Is he as beautiful is thou art, Jokanaan?”

  “Get thee behind me! I hear in the palace the beating of the wings of the angel of death.”

  “Finish him!” someone shouts from the crowd, and the Lady Salome grins a wide carnivorous grin for her audience. And I see that her teeth are not human teeth, but the sharp teeth of some night-stalking beast, the teeth of a shadow slipping over the windowsill.

  “Put the sad old bastard out of his misery!” shouts someone else, a boy in a wolf mask snuggled up next to one of the owls.

  “Fuck that! Put him out of ours?” shouts one of the rabbits. “Peace!” bellows Old Man Raven with a voice like thunder heard from many miles away. “You are always crying out, you lot. You cry out like a beast of prey. Your voices weary me. Peace, I tell you!” And then he turns to the ginger-skinned creature. “Salome, think on what thou art doing. It may be that this man comes from God. He is a holy man.”

  The crowd snickers, and there’s a smattering of applause. “Indeed, he is!” shouts a rabbit. “He is wholly limp and flaccid!” An eruption of laughter then, and I want to go after my fox boy now. Not later. Later, he might have found someone else. Later, he might not even remember me.

  “I will kiss thy mouth, Jokanaan,” Lady Salome tells the prophet, speaking past that mouthful of dagger teeth, her voice even more poisonous than the stingers in my head.

  “I will not look at thee,” the bearded man replies, his voice beginning to quaver. “Thou art accursed, Salome, thou art accursed.” And now she seizes the bearded man by the jaw and forces his head up and back so he’s staring directly into her predatory eyes. “But I will kiss thy mouth, Jokanaan,” she tells him. “You will see. I will kiss thy mouth.”

  And then the crowd falls silent, and I can feel the simmering expectation lacing that silence like strychnine. The executioner draws his sword, and even through the smoke, the blade glints dully, and I know it’s not a prop, not some toy for pantomimes and passion plays. The Lady Salome releases her grip on the prophet’s jaw, then turns and ascends the low stage and takes her place upon the golden throne. The silence has grown so heavy, it will soon crush me flat, I think, and I wish I were still lying unconscious and unknowing on the autumn carpet, or that my fox boy and I were still curled together in my fold-away bed, safe and warm beneath clean flannel sheets and goose-down comforters.

  Look away, I hear my fox boy say, my rusty October scarecrow cooped up inside my aching skull with all the wasps and honey bees. But I’m not so far gone I don’t know it’s only me speaking to me, because he would never have me look away. He would have me see it all, would have me stare into the abyss until I am blind and can see no more, and still he would not have me look away.

  The executioner—whose name I have already forgotten—raises his sword, and surely this is as tar as it goes. Surely, this is where it ends, and in a moment there will be gales of laughter, fucking hurricanes of laughter, and I will feel so foolish at the way my heart has begun to race and the cold sweat beading on my palms.

  The sword comes down, cleanly dividing the bearded man’s head from his shoulders. He does not scream or cry out, does not make any sound at all that I can detect. Blood sprays from the stump of his neck, catching the executioner and Old Man Crow, though neither of them so much as flinch. His body sinks slowly to the floor; it seems to take a very longtime for it to fall, and already Old Man Crow has retrieved the head and is placing it on a silver serving tray just like the ones the bulldogs have been using for martinis and cosmos and shots of tequila.

  And I cannot look away. To save my life, I could not look away.

  “Now, give me the head of Jokanaan!” says the Lady Salome. And Old Man Crow, smug and bloodstained beneath purple robes and the sun fastened to his brow, offers up the severed head of the prophet to the temptress on her throne. She lifts the skull by its scraggly hair and holds it high so all may see her prize. Blood pools in her lap and streams down her long legs.

  “Well,” she says, “I know that thou wouldst have loved me, and the mystery of Love is greater than the mystery of Death.”

  And I feel hands upon my shoulders, smooth and soothing hands, hands that might yet deliver me from this nightmare, but I cannot look away.

  “Ah,” sighs Salome. “Thou wouldst not suffer me to kiss thy mouth, Jokanaan. Well, I will kiss it now. I will bite it with my teeth as one bites ripe fruit. Yes, I will kiss thy mouth, Jokanaan,” and then she does, pressing her lips to the lips of the dead man.

  And where only a moment before, the room was filled with masked faces, it is occupied now with the snarling muzzles and snouts of things which have never been men and never shall be men, with lolling tongues and sharp white canines snapping viciously at the smoky air. And I feel my fox boy’s paws resting there upon my shoulders, and he whispers the way a fox would whisper, “So you see, kitsune? Not like Mardi Gras at all. It is only like itself.”

  “Yes,” I reply, wishing he would cover my eyes so I would no longer have to watch as the Lady Salome finishes her kiss and begins to feed.

  “I should not have left you here alone,” my fox boy says. “That was not very kind of me.”<
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  “What happens next?” I ask him and realize that I am crying. “What do we do now?”

  “Oh, that’s the easy part,” he replies. “Now we only have to take our places and join the dance.” And a minute or two later, he steps around to the front of the cranberry-red sofa, my beautiful, beautiful fox boy in his Marie Antoinette gown, and I see that there is hardly any boy left of him now. Maybe there was never very much to begin with.

  “You can dance, can’t you?” he asks, and then he curtsies and winks and leads me down to the feast.

  The Voyeur in the

  House of Glass

  Somewhere out beyond this world which is only the rotating cages of steel and glass, the Barker’s voice rises like a siren melody, luring in the hungry and unwary, singing a million wandering ships towards hidden reefs and jagged headlands. Two bits! he calls down from his high place in the spotlight glare. Just two measly bits, and we’ll rip your hulls wide and drown you in the cold and briny deep, but never fora moment will you regret it, Sir or Madam. Never will you die unfulfilled. You’ll thank us, yes you will, and ask for more. Just two bits and your immortal soul and whatever flesh you can or cannot spare—a small price to pay, a king’s ransom, a steal, a bargain at thrice that amount.

  And here I sit at the center of the wheel, the sparkling hub, the wheel within the wheel, sitting upright, never slumping on my stool, with his melodic naiad voice raining down upon me. But he did not sing me here; I would be here with or without his dulcet charms. I did not need the carnival’s gaudy handbills, posters, and broadsheets to show me the way. I did not need enticements and main-street parades. My own bed of my own making, so leave me to it. Leave me here alone at the heart of the Barker’s wheel. Do not even speak my name, for I will not look away. Not even for an instant. He has tried that trick so many times now, but I will not ever look away. This fantastic contraption built only for me—my desire’s optic cradle—a hundred eyepieces positioned just so that I might simply lean forward and peer though, catching the precious light off roof and Porro prisms, images bounced with rare precision along the brass tubes of a dozen spy glasses. All these windows laced together with wooden struts and glue, steel rods and spot welds, thoughtful hand cranks placed here and here and here that I may easily reposition this or that portal to suit my momentary needs.