by Diane Duane
They passed into a great square courtyard, of which the front wall had been only one side. All around the courtyard, pillars held trellis-work smothered with sweet-smelling flowers. The pavement of the courtyard was of some pale polished stone; doves strutted and cooed there, peering at themselves in the wide pool of water which mirrored the rosy glow. All about the translucent pavement, golden things and jewels were scattered, uncounted riches, shining in the glow. Flisch amd Mariarta drifted after the child toward the source of the light, the far side of the courtyard, veiled in mist as the house had been from the outside. There were pillars and flowery vines again, the vines this time hanging thickly about a wide couch, to make a bower. Almost the flowers brushed the creamy silk of the couch, the sweet smell distilling from them so strongly that anyone who came there would have no choice but to sleep. Before that couch, Flisch dropped to his knees. Mariarta could not resist doing the same, letting the bag fall beside her. The drowsiness that stole over her was so sweet, almost a physical thing, touching her body everywhere like gently stroking hands, warm, irresistible. Her eyelids fluttered, trying to close; but at the same time she could not look away from the source of the light—rosy, beautiful, the woman who lay on the couch, drowsing too, her body brushed by the flowers as she turned slowly and raised herself on one elbow to look at them.
In Mariarta’s memory, every beautiful woman she had ever seen seemed to have been trying to look like this one; and not one of them had succeeded. This beauty was the perfect blush of young womanhood, full, ripe and enticing; you wished desperately that it would take you to its breast, hold you there, only brush your lips with its own; surely you would become as immortal as she. For unquestionably, this was a goddess. Anything she touched would partake of her beauty; anything those divine lips touched would become deathless. An eternity of delight seemed to wait in her regard, pleasures that soothed and burned. On her knees, Mariarta’s body moved, yearning toward the goddess, desperate for her touch.
“Yes,” the soft voice said. Mariarta had no strength in her limbs, but that voice pulled softly at something inside her. Warmth flowed, her body moved without her will. Her eyes closed; she no longer needed them to see the Lady. She could see her better without them; only the rosy glow was there, a living essence of love and power. Here she might rest forever, and worship...
“Yes,” the voice said. Old reflexes died hard; Mariarta managed to open her eyes enough to see the beautiful shape rise gracefully from its couch and step forward. She bent to Flisch, reaching out arms to him; he grasped them, his face empty of everything but desire. “Ahh,” the Lady said. Mariarta saw Flisch stiffen as if transfixed, saw his face twist in ecstasy. “Yes,” she said in that beautiful voice, like the doves cooing about her feet, “here you shall stay forever, and be my lover, the lover of the Queen of Love. Feel that. You shall feel that forever, again and again. You know how much you want that. You will never leave me, will you?”
“No, oh no,” Mariarta heard Flisch whisper. The Lady let him go: he collapsed at her feet, like a puppet with cut strings.
That beauty turned to Mariarta. She could feel the Lady’s presence on her skin, as if she were another sun. The presence itself was a caress, so that Mariarta closed her eyes and bit her lip for the deliciousness of it. The Queen of Love, Mariarta thought, dazed with the overpowering sweetness of the Lady’s closeness. That was it. The book...doves and sparrows followed her; the blind boy was her son and servant... One of the Old powers indeed. Not the one she had been looking for...but that hardly mattered. The Lady reached out, and Mariarta’s hands came up, reached out; were taken—
The blast of power that went through Mariarta was like lightning, blissful lightning. She was blinded, felt nothing but that burning glow, like roses set afire. The sweetness filled her, paralyzing. Mariarta wanted nothing more than to feel that terrible beauty in her body again and again, forever. Oh say the words, she begged, say what you said to him—
“So,” the voice said, from the heart of the burning glow. “She would have a jest with me, would she.” There was an edge of danger in the sweetness, the thorn of the burning rose. “A maiden! What she sees in you milk-and-water creatures, I will never know. But no matter. You think you can serve two mistresses, young virgin? How wrong you are.” Mariarta writhed with pain at the sudden cruelty in the words, but still wanted that pain more than anything. The hands pulled away. “Not when my sister rules you still. Oh, you shall feel my power, young virgin. You shall tell my sister, when your soul comes to her at last, what it means to mock Duonna Vrene. My sister shall find little left to play her hunting games with.”
Mariarta crumpled at the goddess’s feet, moaning like a beast, her body wracked with the loss of the bliss that had coursed through her while Vrene held her hands. She sensed the goddess moving back to Flisch, reaching down to draw him to her. He grovelled in an ecstasy at her feet, whispering, “Great Lady...great one...”
“Yes,” the Lady cooed, still bending over him, “worship me, mortal man. Worship me, and I will reward you well, reward you forever.”
“Please...please,” Flisch whispered.
“Yes,” the goddess said, sitting upon her couch again, gathering Flisch to her beautiful breasts. He stiffened again, all his limbs in a rigor. “Worship,” said the goddess, “so that I may taste your little desire of me, and drink it deep. Lifetimes of desire you shall have, until I weary of you. And even then you will desire the fate that comes to you, and love it as you love me, blessing and worshipping my name even as your soul is consumed. For am I not the Queen of Love?”
Flisch moaned with pleasure. Duonna Vrene laughed, stroking Flisch’s hair. “You shall stay here forever, my lord,” she said. “My servant shall do your bidding as he does mine. Everything you desire he shall bring you, all the riches of the world. And even I will be yours, for eternities...until I tire of you.”
Mariarta groaned and pushed herself up, desperate to see what happened to Flisch, desperate that it should happen to her. But You are bespelled! something said inside her: a more familiar voice, cooler.
She groped about her, tried to find strength to get even to her knees. Her hand was cold. Someone was standing near her. “Help,” she whispered, looking up. The naked child was gone; standing in his place was a dwarf, one of the small dark Venetian men, such as had brought Urs his lamb. Mariarta thought suddenly of the other picture in Luzi’s book, standing against that of the lady of the sparrows and doves; her beautiful son, winged, irresistible, once maybe the greatest of the Old gods, but now, since the Cry, dwindled into her slave, wing-clipped and blind, a malicious creature that went about her errands with never a care for who he struck with his arrows. Sometimes he seemed like a new-weaned babe, the book had said. Sometimes like a fair youth. But always blind—
The dwarf leered at Mariarta, milky-eyed, and his laugh was like the hiss of a cat.
She tried to move again. Suddenly the naked child was back, mild-eyed, sweet-faced, smiling. Mariarta blinked. Her bag was open; a scrap of something dark showed in it—the bronze statue. Her hand had been on it.
Bronze, Mariarta thought. Gold she saw everywhere, and copper, and every kind of precious stone: but never a wink of bronze, or iron.
Desperate, Mariarta fumbled in her pack. But bright eyes fastened on her, hungry, like claws. The pleasure struck Mariarta again, running down her nerves like sweet fire. It was not the warmth she had felt once in her dream; that was strangely chaste beside this, as if it was herself provoking herself to it. Here was a clear sense of another, of soft lips, warm breath, something that breathed quick and soft with desire, in her ear, in her open mouth—breathing her breath, her own lungs falling into synchrony with the other’s desire, her body moving of its own accord, feeling the other’s body clasp hers: astounded, near senseless, she writhed with the delight of it. Nothing but this, said the sweet voice in her mind, honeyed, caressing, warm, wet, the voice that spoke with the tongue that brushed her lips, and slipped
deliciously inward. Nothing but this, forever. Forget dreams, forget the sight of the sky, the life of the world. Know only this dusk, this pleasure, forever: my arms, my lips. Mine, mine...
Yes, the most part of Mariarta cried inside, no more searching, yes, yours, this pleasure forever, yes! But some other part of her moaned, Never more any stars? Never more the sunlight? Stubborn, desperate, that part of her groped Mariarta’s hand about, came on the hide wrapping of the statue, fumbled with it. The pleasure was too great, the hand fell away, defeated; then slowly tried again, slipped away again, slipped—
Cold against her hand, cold like the ice of the outer wall. She hunched up, the pleasure lost at a stroke, her body shivering in reaction. Trembling, Mariarta fumbled the statue out of its wrapping of hide, clutched it and her bag to her. There was the dwarf again, stepping back from her, amusement still in the dreadful twisted face, but also fear. Mariarta looked around, shaking with cold.
The pillars had not changed. The flowers had not changed, or the rosy light. All about, the gems and gold things lay.
And the bones. “Flisch,” she cried, “the bones, the bones!!”
He knelt, blind at Duonna Vrene’s feet, heard nothing. The skulls lay everywhere among the gold; some cracked the long way, as if dropped like a tortoise from above; some smashed open topwise, like eggs a weasel has bitten open to get at the sweet insides. The long bones lay about, thigh-bones, arm-bones, every one cracked and sucked for the marrow. The sparrows bobbed about among them, picking at the scraps of flesh. Mariarta crouched in on herself at the horror of it, the treasure and the charnel all tumbled together, as if the mistress of the place could not tell the difference.
And the mistress of the place—
Only her voice was unchanged. Nothing could change that: “the imperishable laughter,” Luzi’s book had called it, and that voice rang out sweet and caressing, promising every pleasure, able to perform. But the body was sere, wearing no rich bloom of flesh, but brown-mottled skin dry as parchment with age, gone to flapping wattles that hung from lank arms. The silken robes hung in webby rags on those limbs; the moth had been at the silks, and worse than the moth. The face— Mariarta hid her eyes, moaning. How did she ever look beautiful, she thought, yet wanted to weep for the beauty lost. Bones, the bones!—a skull as dry as any of those lying on the floor, the skin stuck to it like old paper; the balls of the eyes rotted to black, the rest of them the color of too-old curd, white with a touch of green, the corruption just coming— Mariarta hid her face, understanding where Duonna Vrene’s servant got his blindness. The rest of her was as terrible, but Flisch was blind to it. He could not see what bones and rags of flesh clasped his head to the hollow, bladdery breast, could not see what white horrors of hands softly turned his slack-jawed, swooning face up to be kissed, could not see the mouth and what moved in it as it came down, eager too—
“Flisch!” she screamed. “Tell her no!” For that was all it would need—
“Is that what you want, my lord, my darling?” said the soft voice, caressing. Even now, her hands tight on the statue, Mariarta felt that voice fighting with someone else in her for dominion. Mariarta and the someone were winning—but only for the moment. Eyes the color of corruption fixed on Mariarta, filled with hatred, but willing to love her again, as long as the love led to the devouring at last. “Tell her so then, so she leaves us in peace. Do you want to tell me no?”
Flisch’s head slowly turned to look at Mariarta. In his eyes was Vrene’s blindness. Only a look of slack pleasure lived in his face. “No. I want you... whatever you want... anything. Yours... yours forever....”
Flisch’s head turned back to pillow itself against the worm-eaten silks; turned up again, lusting, waiting for the kiss. Only a moment more, Duonna Vrene looked at Mariarta, with an expression of imbecile triumph. Then she turned away and slowly lowered her face to Flisch’s again....
Mariarta fled, hating herself for her cowardice, but not daring to stay, fearing to hear the screams. She ran past the treasures, out through the stroking wood. No screams followed her; only a long, soft coo of pleasure that went on and on, and slowly became double, echoing in the dusk behind her. That was worst of all.
Out through the graven, gold-strewn cave Mariarta fled, into the screaming night, the snow whipping around her.
***
She would not stay in the circle of mountains. When it was light, she made her way to the hut, got Catsch, and started walking. She did not stop until Pietsch, where she fed the donkey, then sat on a stone, and found she could not rise for weeping. One of the townspeople finally overcame his shyness, coming out to ask what the trouble was. They could get little out of her except a tale of what seemed a hunting expedition that went badly—the young hunter’s companion somehow come to grief in a cavern on the mountain. They fed Mariarta, left her in a spare bed, and let her sleep until the next day: she thanked them and went slowly down the road that led to the Bishop’s city.
It was only a few hours before Mariarta turned the last curve of the road and found the grey towers of the Hof staring at her. Their look was less grim: there seemed to be a shade of pity in it. Mariarta walked gladly enough under the shadow of those towers, to the back gate of Chur.
Baseli stood there. He said no word to Mariarta, but he noticed she was alone. She felt his eyes on her from behind as she walked into the town. She would have to deal with him later, but right now other matters were on her mind.
She took Catsch to the inn, stabled him, then went out and walked across town. Not far from the back gate was a steep, broad flight of steps that led into the bottom of a great square tower: “the Bishop’s doorstep”, the townspeople called it. Mariarta climbed the steps, passed under the tower’s dark arch, and came out into the square outside the Bishop’s palace.
The palace itself was simple enough, grey stone with shuttered windows. Over the door was carved the Bishops’ ibex, prancing in its castellated gateway: the arms of Chur. Mariarta only glanced at this, and the guards by the door, then turned to the cathedral across the square.
It was the mightiest church she had ever seen, with a great tower topped by a shining bronze dome; the huge doors were all figured with carven shapes of saints and wise and foolish virgins and all manner of others, seemingly struggling to get in. Mariarta went to one of those doors, pulled it open and entered.
It was a long time since she had been comfortable in a church—not since before the night she came into the church in Tschamut and heard someone breaking open the font. Mariarta’s intention was to go in, light a candle for Flisch’s soul, pray for forgiveness for having led him to so terrible a fate: then to get away into the wilderness, where she could do no one else any harm. But the wonderful inside of the church distracted her. It was not a bright place: the windows ran down only one side. But by the altar, banks of candles burned in iron holders, and a great radiance spread from them to the altarpiece, a triptych of praying forms, all gilded and jeweled. Mariarta wondered that the sight of gold didn’t make her shudder. But here it was different.
She went to one of the candle-banks by the side of the altar, lit one, knelt on the stone floor to pray. It seemed much darker when she opened her eyes again. Maybe I slept, she thought, embarrassed, and got up. She passed before the altar, bowed, and went past the side altar on her way out. On the altar, Mariarta noticed, was a reliquary, rich with gold in the dimness. Momentarily curious, she bent close to the small crystal set in the face of the reliquary. It was hard to see, but there seemed to be a scrap of singed cloth in there, and a chipped off spinter of stone.
Mariarta shook her head, stepped away from the altar—and stopped, staring at one of the paintings on the side wall.
It was a little old man, in a monk’s robe; so bent with age that it seemed a miracle he could stand. His face was kindly, wrinkled everywhere like a dried apple with smile-lines. Next to him sat a calm-looking bear. The man’s hands were raised in prayer. Off to one side were smaller paintings:
the oddest of them showed the bear and an ox, bizarrely yoked together and pulling a wood-cart with a peasant woman riding in it, while the man walked alongside. Mariarta turned her attention back to the main painting. In it with the man were a great number of people, sitting on the ground, listening to him. Painted smaller, behind him, was a woman in a nun’s habit; the paint was flaking off her face, possibly from a wet place in the plaster—but Mariarta didn’t think she needed to see it. What surprised her were the haloes around the man’s head, and the woman’s.
Soft footsteps approached her. “My son,” said a calm voice, “is there something you seek?”
Mariarta swallowed. “Father, who are these people, please?”
“Why, that’s good old Saint Luzius, Chur’s patron saint, who came to preach to the heathens in this part of the world, long ago. He was king in a country called Bretagna, somewhere near Irlanda of the monks; they say he renounced his throne to come here and preach. They made him the first bishop of Chur—it would have been seven hundred years ago now. And that is his sister Saint Emerita, who came with him, and left a princess’s life for a hermit’s.”
“So long ago,” Mariarta whispered.
