by James Maxey
“You’re rather dashing, with that crimson bandana,” Sorrow said, adjusting the way it rested on my cheeks, if a coconut had cheeks. I found myself curious about what other colors I might be wearing. With my amber vision, I’d thought all my clothing was shades of brown, but for all I knew she might have dressed me to rival a peacock.
“Follow,” she said, and I followed.
WE PASSED THE night in one of the luxury suites aboard the Black Swan. I’d been in similar suites before. During the times in my life when I was blessed with money, I saw little reason to hoard it. “Seize the day!” was my motto, though in practice this usually meant “grab the bottle!” The old Black Swan had been destroyed when Greatshadow attacked Commonground, and this new room was so clean and polished that the light of a single bedside lamp hurt my new eyes. Sorrow hadn’t bothered to give my coconut face a nose, but when she hung her cloak in the closet, the scent of fresh pine was powerful enough I could taste it in my false mouth despite my lack of a tongue. Formerly, the rooms I’d stayed in had sported artwork in which scantily clad pagan goddesses had been a popular theme. Now, the paintings on the wall were all landscapes in muted colors. I suppose it was more tasteful, but I also thought it was a little dull.
Sorrow placed me in the corner of the room and told me to sit. She returned to the door and sealed it shut by molding the frame to the wood of the door itself. She stripped down unselfconsciously before me, changing into a simple cotton nightgown. Again, I noted the health of the right half of her body, and the dark veins, wrinkles, and amber blotches of her left side. “You may not move tonight unless danger arises while I’m sleeping, in which case you are free to defend me. Remain alert; your senses may be dulled by your new encasement, but you have far less to distract you than you did in life. You have no need for sleep or food or water now; focus your attention on any noises from the hall.”
She climbed into the bed of silk and was asleep in moments, the covers pulled almost to her chin despite the tropical heat. Her bed was surrounded by a veil of mosquito netting, but I could see her easily enough, even in the darkness. Like Infidel, she proved to be a restless sleeper. All through the night, she tossed and mumbled.
I wondered how she had come to be named Sorrow. It seemed off-key for a nickname, since it was neither cruel nor funny, and it didn’t strike me as the sort of name a person would willingly choose for herself. But it made little sense as a given name, either. What mother would wish such a label upon her daughter?
SORROW ROSE BEFORE dawn, lingering a while before a mirror as she ran her fingers around the dark, inflamed flesh surrounding one of the nails driven into her scalp. This was the nail that looked like it was carved from mahogany. To judge by her wincing, the wound felt as painful as it looked. She applied a bit of pressure and a bead of thick amber puss bubbled up. She wiped it away with a cotton ball soaked in alcohol, as a deep frown once more lined her face. She worked the last of the puss from the wound, and took a moment to drag her fingers around her scalp. Even in the dim candlelight, I could see a haze of stubble had arisen during the night. It seemed her baldness was the product of a razor.
An hour later we were back outside, amidst a cacophony of hammers and saws. Commonground was busily being rebuilt by the river pygmies, and the docks by the Wanderers, both of whom relied on the town as an economic hub.
I followed Sorrow to the shore and recognized the path she was walking toward a tangle of dense trees. Sitting in the upper branches of one particularly robust mangrove was what was left of a sailboat. The ground beneath the boat had been picked clean by river-pygmy scavengers, but despite the relative ease of climbing the gnarled and knotty trees, it looked as if the boat was unmolested. Even out of water, everyone would have recognized this as my boat. In life, I was hardly a fearsome enough figure to discourage looters. Infidel, however, had a reputation as someone who didn’t trifle with thieves. She’d lived here a few days following Greatshadow’s attack, and had made it her home since returning from the hunt. Until word got out that she’d lost her powers, the place was safe.
“Climb,” said Sorrow, as she hopped upon my back. Her arms wrapped around my neck in a way that would have choked me if I’d needed to breathe. I barely felt her weight upon me. Nor, I should note, did I much feel my own weight. The soggy driftwood had dried a good bit during the night and my limbs felt stronger and steadier than they had before. In one of the few civil conversations I’d ever had with Hookhand, he told me that when he’d first put on his hook, it had been a lifeless weight strapped to the stump of his arm, but over time he felt as if the ghost of his hand had flowed into it, and that, impossible as it seemed, he’d been able to feel things with the cold iron.
While there was no mistaking my new body’s crude sense of touch for the nuance of actual flesh, I found that there was some truth to Hookhand’s story. My phantom fingers had flowed into the roots beneath my gloves, and I could sense the pressure as I grasped the branches, and feel the spiky bark digging into my wooden palms. My sense of hearing had improved during the night, and though I was hampered by my single-hued vision, my ability to focus was improving.
I climbed over the railing of my boat. The vessel had been in poor repair for years, but a few weeks in the branches had warped and twisted the deck into a surface where not a single plank could be described as flat. It looked as if the whole thing could fall apart in a good stiff wind, though that was currently being tested, as the omnipresent sea breeze kept the whole structure swaying. Sorrow dropped from my back and called out, “Hello?”
There was no answer. She looked around, then crouched to enter what remained of the cabin. I knelt to watch. I was never fastidious in my housekeeping, but the place was a disaster even by my slovenly standards. The boat had obviously flipped end over end when the tidal wave carried it here. Everything had been drenched as well, and what books I could see were coated with mold. My heart ached as I contemplated the ruined pages. Despite my early years in the monastery orphanage where I was taught to read and write, I’ve always considered myself an autodidact. I’ve stuffed my skull with information both trivial and profound without the guidance of any teachers other than these books. I mourned their death as much as I would have mourned the passing of a human friend.
I couldn’t blame Infidel for the poor state of my belongings. Even if she had emptied out the cabin and tried to salvage the books, the truth was most had mildewed long ago, as I tended to keep my reading material in tottering stacks by my bedside rather than safely arranged in glass cases. Perhaps it was the combination of my lax housekeeping and the tidal wave destruction that had led Infidel to simply ignore this mess. She slept in a hammock she’d strung in the branches above the deck, with a patch of sail stretched overhead serving as a roof.
Sorrow sighed. She grumbled, as much to the wind as to me, “My grandmother used to say one should never buy a pig in a poke. I’d imagined the grandson of Judicious Merchant would have taken better care of his writings.”
I silently chuckled inside my driftwood cage, delighted at her consternation. For while I’d been a lackluster guardian of my reading materials, I was far more diligent with my own writing. Somewhere under all the clutter and debris was my grandfather’s sea chest. It was tightly constructed from high quality cedar and utterly air tight. All my important papers were probably safe inside, but she had no way of knowing this. It was her own fault for not carving me a tongue, or even allowing me to write in the sand.
Sorrow cast her gaze upwards, shielding her eyes with her hand. Infidel was coming near, the Gloryhammer glowing like a second sun. A darker shape followed closely behind, flapping awkward, ungainly wings. Some sort of injured pelican?
Infidel covered the half mile that separated us in mere seconds, wisely choosing to land on a thick limb beside the boat rather than on the deck itself. She nodded in greeting toward Sorrow, then looked at me. “Who’s this?”
“A little extra muscle,” said Sorrow. “I haven’t both
ered to name him yet. I guess I’ll call him Drifter.”
“You can’t just ask him his name?”
“He’s the strong silent type. Very, very silent.”
By now, the flapping shape that had followed Infidel caught up, lighting on the branch beside her. It was a creature I’d never seen before, with the body, legs, and ears of a hound-dog, but with wings, big webbed claws and a long, ungainly beak like a pelican. The overall appearance was comical, but also unnerving, for the creature’s form was ever shifting, with the margin around his neck and chest where feathers transitioned into fur ebbing and flowing in slow, rippling waves.
“That’s your, uh, man-dog?” asked Sorrow. “The shape-shifter? Menagerie?”
“Yeah,” said Infidel. “This morning I found him on deck chewing on a freshly killed pelican. His face was coated with the blood. I was going to leave him at the ship, but when I jumped into the air to fly here, he turned into this and gave chase.”
“Maybe the pelican blood gave him a new form?” Sorrow said.
“Maybe. But he also sucked my blood when he was a tick, so why didn’t he change back into a human?”
“I’m not an authority on blood magic,” said Sorrow. “But, I can see the auras of living things, and this creature has not even the faintest hint of a human aura. It doesn’t possess the spiritual template to change into a man.”
“Whatever,” Infidel said. “Humans are vastly overrated in my book. I hope Menagerie gets better, but for now you have to admit it’s kind of cool that I have a flying dog.”
Sorrow shrugged and looked back into the cabin. “That’s a very positive attitude. It would be equally accurate to say that you merely have the affection of an exceptionally ugly bird.”
“There’s no need to be nasty,” said Infidel.
“Is there not?” said Sorrow. “I entered into this deal foolishly, I admit. The citizens of Commonground aren’t famous for their honesty. There was something about your aura that led me to trust you. Most dishonest people have feeble and dirty auras. Yours was bright and clear; I thought that in this city of sin, I’d somehow stumbled upon a true innocent. Yet, rather than finding the organized collection of books and maps I thought I was purchasing, I find only rotting litter.”
Infidel stepped gingerly onto the deck. “I didn’t cheat you,” she said, ducking into the cabin, motioning for Sorrow to follow.
Sorrow glanced at me and said, “Don’t move,” then followed.
Menagerie lingered behind, perched on the branch, staring at me, his head tilted.
Though I couldn’t move my physical form, I tried to speak. A ghost voice tore from my ghost throat and echoed in my ghost ears, though the morning air was silent save for the chirping of birds and the distant stir of the waves.
“Menagerie!” I called to the dog-bird. “Can you hear me? Can you hear me?”
The dog furrowed his brow as it loped onto the deck. Its head became almost fully hound as it took the time to sniff me, then flowed back toward pelican as it sat on its haunches and looked up at my face.
“Can you hear me? Say something,” I said.
He didn’t say anything.
“Speak!” I said.
Nothing.
“Roll over!” I said, feeling bad that I was treating a man who had once been a brilliant mercenary as if he had only the intelligence to do canine tricks.
He kept staring. Did he not hear me? Did his dog form not understand that command? What other commands could I try? I couldn’t tell him to heel or fetch since I was immobile. Telling him to sit was pointless since he was already sitting.
“Shake?” I said, rather tentatively since I couldn’t move my arms.
Menagerie raised his right front leg with its webbed bird’s foot. With his hound dog eyes, he looked positively heartbroken when I left him hanging.
CHAPTER FIVE
SORROW WOULD SOON KNOW MY NAME
“BY THE SACRED quill,” gasped Infidel as she dragged my sea-chest out onto the deck. The thing was five feet long, three feet tall and wide, solidly constructed and stuffed to the brim. I’m surprised she could move it without her old powers. She collapsed against the railing and wiped her brow. “That wasn’t fun.”
“I’m learning not to believe everything I hear in Commonground,” Sorrow said as she, too, emerged from the cabin.
“Look, don’t get distracted by all the ruined books,” said Infidel. “The real treasure’s in this box.”
“I was referring to the stories I’d heard of your strength,” said Sorrow. “I’d been told you were as strong as a score of men, but even one man could have gotten that sea-chest out of the cabin with less effort. I’d also heard that swords bounced off your skin, but your face certainly doesn’t lend much credence to that claim.”
“Oh,” said Infidel, sliding her fingers along the thin brown scabs that lay upon her cheeks. “My powers, uh, only kick in when I’m fighting. I don’t waste magic on moving furniture.”
“I see,” said Sorrow, kneeling in front of the chest. She contemplated the big brass lock on the front. “Do you have the key?”
“Sorry,” Infidel said, shaking her head. She grabbed the Gloryhammer. “Stand back and I’ll knock the lock off.”
“That won’t be needed. If you’re willing to damage the lock to open the chest, there’s no need for me to respect its integrity.”
She grasped the padlock, squishing it between her fingers like a ball of clay. She twisted the metal and tugged it away from the chest, stretching it like taffy until it snapped.
“Looks like you’ve got some inhuman strength of your own there,” said Infidel.
“Nonsense,” said Sorrow. “My strength is unremarkable. As a materialist, I comprehend ordinary matter in a way that your untrained eyes cannot. You believe the illusion that the material world is made of solid objects. I can see through this illusion.”
“You sound like Zetetic,” said Infidel. “In Greatshadow’s lair, we encountered a room carved from false matter. It had no fixed form or color. He said this was the original state of all matter.”
“I sound nothing like Zetetic,” said Sorrow. “Though I never met the man, Deceivers believe all of reality to be a shared fiction, lacking objective truth. I don’t dispute the reality of the material world; indeed, I study it and understand it. The key concept is that the things we think of as solid objects are composed of much tinier particles. If you could shrink to the size of a flea, the smooth surface of this lock would be revealed as a rugged landscape of boulders. Shrink to the size of a dust mote, and you would find that the boulders are built of individual grains. If you could become so small as to be invisible, you would find that these grains cling to one another like damp sand. Even a child on the beach can sculpt and mold damp sand using only their bare hands.”
“But that lock wasn’t made of sand,” said Infidel.
Sorrow shrugged. “My analogy is difficult for the uninitiated to follow. The true nature of matter is so counterintuitive that our language lacks words to accurately describe it.” She pulled her cloak back, revealing the scalp full of nails. “Even I couldn’t learn the truth through mere language. I had to have reality driven into my brain directly. Every nail in my skull is made from a pure material form. These have been placed in contact with the portion of my mind that perceives the corresponding substance. The copper nail gives me command over copper, which was the primary component of this brass lock.”
Infidel grimaced when she saw Sorrow’s scalp. I was a little queasy myself, since the wooden nail that had been infected this morning was now even worse. Dark veins ran from the wound, which was now an ugly bruise, almost black, fading to lighter hues of amber at the edges.
“Most metals are simple,” said Sorrow. “In their natural state they hold a faint echo of the primal spirit of Krag, the dragon of earth, but this spirit is driven out in the smelting process. Thus, they have no will to resist my magic. I recently expanded my repertoire to include
wood. It’s been a thousand years since Verdant, the primal dragon of the forest, last spread his spirit into trees, but even so, as once-living material, wood possesses a cellular memory that can fight my manipulations. It’s exhausting in both body and spirit to make use of it. However, it’s worth the price I pay, since wood can be imbued with a persistent animating spirit, unlike iron or copper.”
Infidel’s brow wrinkled. “I’m not sure I’m following you. Are you saying anyone could bang a nail into her head and gain your powers?”
“With the right nail, in exactly the right place, to precisely the right depth,” she said. “But not anyone. Only women are able to master the art. Feminine prowess in magic is a threat to the male assumption of superiority. Thus, the patriarchal powers-that-be label me a witch and a heretic. So be it. I wear their slurs as a badge of honor.”
Infidel grinned. “I know where you’re coming from. I hated it at first when people called me ‘Infidel.’ Now I’ve come to like it. I guess it was your enemies who named you Sorrow?”
As she spoke, Infidel repeatedly scratched the scabs on her face. It was almost impossible to look at Sorrow’s scalp, with its festering wound and stubbled hair, and not feel itchy. If my own hands hadn’t been paralyzed, I would have been scratching my coconut dome.
