Changer's Daughter

by Jane Lindskold

  This, however, is not what keeps him from taking the hand that Teresa holds out to him. Pride stops him. He has no wish to be Regis’s dog, taking the scraps the Chief General Doctor throws him, no matter how tasty those scraps might be.

  So Katsuhiro smiles his nervous sariman smile and walks to the desk. A pitcher of ice water is there, an unopened bottle of wine, and a box of candy.

  “It is very hot in here,” he says, pouring water. “May I offer you a drink?”

  “Let me pour,” Teresa says, gliding over to him, graceful despite those impossible shoes.

  “Very well.”

  When she is beside him, Katsuhiro leans close as if to kiss the graceful curve of her throat. Teresa stiffens only a little.

  “Are we,” he whispers, his mouth close to her ear, his nostrils full of the light scent of her perfume mingled with the more enticing smell of her body, “being watched or taped?”

  The scantiness of her attire makes quite certain that she is not wearing a body wire, but he cannot search the room without his suspicions becoming evident.

  Teresa’s dark eyes widen, and the hand holding the pitcher trembles slightly, but she trusts him, prisoner to prisoner. Setting down the pitcher, she puts her arms around him and nuzzles his beard.

  “I brought nothing,” she murmurs, “but we may be watched. Regis has peepholes all through this building.”

  Katsuhiro’s hand wants to stroke her back, and he lets it, but keeps his touch light.

  “Then we must conceal our talking,” he whispers, “beneath such play. Can you bear it?”

  Now he feels her shaking in his arms. It takes a moment before he realizes that what he feels is laughter, laughter on the edge of hysteria.

  “Most of the pigs,” she says softly, “to whom Regis has sent me, would have raped me by now. I can bear it.”

  “I still want that water,” Katsuhiro says aloud. “Pour for me, Teresa, while I take off my jacket and tie.”

  She pours two glasses and sips a bit from her own. While Katsuhiro drinks, he considers his next move. Some sixth sense warns him that they are being watched, perhaps videotaped. Therefore, he must tell Teresa about Adam carefully, so that she will not reveal her grief.

  “Come here, woman,” he says, “and undress me.”

  She does so, while he makes a great play of unfastening her robe and rubbing her nipples. Part of him feels guilty for his arousal, part of him cynically observes that if he did not appear aroused, certainly this charade would be revealed for what it is.

  Teresa finds excuses to put her ear near his mouth so that he can whisper to her, rubbing her body against his quite shamelessly. Katsuhiro approves of her courage, even as he fights down an impulse to forget his duty to Adam and use her as Regis intended.

  “I have bad news,” he whispers, spacing his words out, “or perhaps good. You must decide. Are you strong?”

  She has him naked by now and reaches out and wraps her hand about his erection.

  “Very strong,” she says aloud, her tone playful, but her eyes full of anticipated sorrow. “Don’t you wish to see me naked?”

  “You tease me almost beyond endurance,” he warns her, making his reply a genuine warning. “I am only a man. Won’t Regis be angry if I take you?”

  “He let me come here,” she says, “and I wish to have you in bed and...”

  She reaches and undoes the bow at her throat that holds her robe closed. Then she lets it fall to her feet. After letting him feast his eyes on her body clad only in pink satin, she peels off the teddy, her moves practiced and easy.

  “Come here,” she says, holding out her hand. “Let us get to know each other better.”

  Katsuhiro understands Teresa’s intention. Lying in bed, they can whisper more easily, and their muttered words will be taken for pillow talk. Still, he wonders how long his self-control can last if he is naked beside her. He hasn’t had a woman since he left Japan, and abstinence is telling. Perhaps Teresa doesn’t care if he takes her. He has at least played at lovemaking, rather than just raping her.

  He lets her guide him into the bed. She reclines on her side, her head with its adornment of pearls and silk on the pillow. Katsuhiro expects her first whisper to be a plea for the promised information but what she says nearly chills his ardor.

  “Do not enter me,” she hisses, “for I am death.”

  Her hand caresses his back beneath the covers to convince any observer that she is doing her best to please him.

  “What?” is his surprised reply.

  “Regis,” she shudders with hate, not with passion, “tells me this when he fucks me. He does it like a dog, from behind, and grunts into my ear—‘You are dead! And you are living death!’”

  She makes a shrill cry that a listener might take for passion, but Katsuhiro can see her eyes and the tears of rage that fill them.

  “Touch me!” she says aloud. “Please, touch me!”

  Katsuhiro strokes her buttocks, then, when she presses his hand there, between her legs. He is unsurprised, but perhaps a little hurt, to find her as dry as the harmattan wind.

  He kisses her forehead by way of apology. Why should he have expected otherwise?

  Teresa buries her face in his shoulder, moving as if excited by his touch, but her words are cool.

  “I think Regis has AIDS and has given it to me. He delights in using me to pass the disease to his rivals. I would kill him, but...”

  “Adam?”

  She loses her poise, though only for a moment.

  “You know him?”

  “We shared a cell.” Katsuhiro now knows he brings this brave, lovely woman only relief. “He is dead these three days.”

  “Oh!” Teresa sobs, disguising her cry as that of a woman in ecstasy. Perhaps she is, in her own way. “Oh, dear God!”

  Then, when she has control of herself again, she whispers, “Are you certain?”

  “Very. He told me he wanted to die, to free you from Regis.”

  “He knew?”

  “Not about the... illness.” Katsuhiro finds that his erection has diminished since Teresa told him her suspicion that she carries AIDS, and that he is very grateful he has no cuts on his hands and has not kissed her mouth more than lightly. “But I think Regis taunted him with this...”

  He runs his hand across her body to indicate her unwilling prostitution.

  “And Adam is dead,” Teresa whispers, her eyes bright with unshed tears.

  “By my hand,” Katsuhiro says softly, remembering Adam’s fear that suicide would send him to Hell, “so God will forgive him.”

  Teresa understands, for which he is grateful. Katsuhiro had dreaded her reaction when she learned that her new ally is also her husband’s killer.

  “As God will forgive me for killing Regis,” she murmurs.

  Katsuhiro holds Teresa close, loving her for her courage. She should have been born Japanese. Perhaps she had been in another life.

  “Can you keep on being brave?” he asks. “We cannot kill Regis until he is disarmed. If he has given any of the smallpox virus to his allies or made provisions for his sudden death...”

  Teresa nods. “Regis would find a way to continue making people suffer, even after he is dead. He is as full of hate as the ocean is with water.”

  “Then you will wait?”

  “I will.” Her whisper is so soft that he almost cannot hear it. “Now, forgive me for this, but Regis will check...”

  To his surprise, she pulls him on top of her.

  “Do not enter me,” she whispers, “for I am death.”

  Then aloud she cries, as if given over to passion, “Finish it now! I cannot wait any longer.”

  Her hips move, thrusting against him. Very careful not to enter her, Katsuhiro does finish, spilling his semen between her thighs, his orgasm and his pleasure unfeigned.

  “Stay a while,” he says aloud when she sits up afterward.

  “I cannot,” she says, “but if we are good, perhaps Regis will
let me visit again. May I use your bathroom to change my clothes? I don’t want your escort to see me this way.”

  “Of course.” He waits beneath the covers, his demeanor that of a man who has just been laid and is pleased with the world.

  When Teresa emerges from the bathroom, dressed again in a short skirt and neat blouse, and gathers up her lingerie, he does not escort her to the door.

  “I hope I will see you again,” he says.

  “I think that is likely.” She smiles, and departs. Before the door closes, Katsuhiro hears his guards jeering and making provocative noises. He wonders if any of them has been favored with Teresa’s attentions.

  He does think it likely that she will be sent to him at least once more, for Regis will want to make certain that the AIDS has taken hold. Rising from the bed, Katsuhiro heads for the shower, worried that despite her promise Teresa will kill Regis and release his farewell gifts upon an innocent world.

  Beneath her surface calm, she does not seem terribly sane; nor does he blame her mind for breaking.

  Rebecca>> So what’s it like being part of a rock and roll star’s entourage?

  Demetrios>> More work than I’d ever imagined. Tommy and Lil are doing auditions, still. I get custody of those who get the job. I also get to arrange for the failures to get home without causing a fuss. I’m still trying to decide what’s worse.

  Rebecca>> Loverboy got a part, didn’t he?

  Demetrios>> Yeah and... well... so did I.

  Rebecca>> Wow! That’s great! :)

  Demetrios>> IS it? I’m not so sure. I never wanted to be in the limelight, but Tommy won’t hear otherwise and... I always liked the guy, but I never realized how persuasive he could be. One moment I’m telling him why I need to be offstage where I can deal with trouble, the next moment he’s asking me to listen to one song, just one. Then he’s strumming the final chords, and I find myself agreeing. I still agree if I don’t think hard about why I shouldn’t.

  Rebecca>> Sounds like he charmed you. Literally.

  Demetrios>> I thought of that. Shame he doesn’t have a better outlet for all that power than making music.

  Rebecca>> Music makes the world go ‘round—or is that love?

  Demetrios>> I think it’s gravity. So we’re to have a mixed group: six fauns, six satyrs. Fortunately, Tommy has picked his backup musicians out of those so we don’t need to have many humans on stage. That just leaves a few dancers, roadies, and the people who do technical stuff with lights and sound boards and all of that.

  Rebecca>> Shame you can’t use theriomorphs for that, too.

  Demetrios>> Don’t you DARE suggest that, Becky Trapper! I’ve got enough people to look after.

  Rebecca>> Sorry. I just wish I could be part of the fun.

  Demetrios>> I’m glad you’re safe there in Oregon. It’s good to know that when this goes to hell I’ll have somewhere to run.

  Rebecca>> Don’t be so pessimistic! What happened to the faun I first met, the one who wanted to rock the boat and change the way the Accord treats theriomorphs?

  Demetrios>> He’s still here, just a bit wiser and a bit more aware of the complications.

  Rebecca>> Aunt Swansdown says that Arthur has convinced Lovern to cook something up for you—something to do with illusions. She was giggling on the phone when she told me about it. They’re calling it fairy dust.

  Demetrios>> Fairy dust? I’d better make certain Georgios doesn’t hear that. On the other hand, what better thing could I threaten him with? Or maybe... Does saltpeter really dull sexual urges?

  Rebecca>> Demi! What a thought! You could ask Garrett.

  Demetrios>> Maybe I should. Later, now. I’ve got to go wipe tears from the eyes of a faun who didn’t make the cut.

  Rebecca>> Later, pal.

  Eddie is reading a local newspaper when a long-armed, skinny monkey climbs in through the window of the boardinghouse into which they’d moved after Dakar threw the chair out their hotel window. The monkey drops wearily to the floor, chattering weakly and pointing toward its mouth.

  “Just a moment,” Eddie says. He drops the paper on the floor and crosses to the adjoining room. “Dakar, Anson’s back!”

  Then he gets a bunch of bananas from a cupboard and brings them to the monkey. He has to peel the first one and feed it chunk by chunk to the exhausted creature. After the monkey finishes a couple more, there is a blur of color and where the monkey had been is the gangling human form of Anson A. Kridd.

  Anson finishes the rest of the bananas just as Dakar Agadez comes in from the adjoining room. Dakar looks at him with surprising compassion and lifts him from the floor to the bed.

  “Got to get your skinny, naked butt off the floor,” Dakar says, by way of greeting. “Still hungry?”

  “Starved, but here is my good Eddie, ministering to my needs. I am like the King, eh?”

  Eddie sets a laden tray down on the bedside table.

  “We’ve had it ready for hours. I was about to give up and order another one, no matter what the landlady would think.”

  Anson dips his fingers into some yam amala and nods his thanks. When he has licked his fingers clean of the soft, doughy stuff he says:

  “I have found him again.”

  “Katsuhiro?” Eddie sounds excited.

  Even Dakar’s disdainful grunt is unconvincing. Anson had located Katsuhiro the very first night he had investigated the Regis compound, but when he had returned the next night to talk with him, Anson had found the cell empty except for the body of his friend Adam. Since then, he has returned to continue the search, pushing his reserves dangerously low.

  “Why’d it take you so long?” Dakar says, pouring Anson a glass of sweet soda. “It shouldn’t take long to find one Nip in a batch of darkies.”

  Anson nods. “It shouldn’t, but my forms are not infinite. The compound is so well guarded that I could not go there as a human, except possibly disguised as one of their own staff. I was not willing to risk that until I had exhausted all other courses of action.

  “Next I tried as a monkey, but a monkey is a daytime creature. In the daytime, the guards took great delight in shooting at me.”

  “I remember,” Dakar grumbles, though it had been he who found the injured monkey, when he had grown concerned that Anson had not returned, and he who had bandaged its wounds so well that Anson had been able to return to his search the next night.

  “So I must be a spider, with a few switches to monkey or man when no one seems to be about.” Anson shrugs, his energy and his good humor returning now that he has consumed some four thousand calories, including a tub of butter, eaten in spoonfuls. “No one sees a spider, but a spider is not so swift, eh?”

  “Na,” Dakar agrees. “So where is the Nip? Is he still breathing?”

  “Breathing,” Anson agrees, “but looking very serious, far too serious for a man who has just had a lovely woman come and climb into his bed.”

  Eddie looks astonished, Dakar indignant. After laughing at their expressions, Anson continues his tale.

  “Window by window I checked the big central command building. I started at the top, climbing there quickly as a monkey and praying not to feel the sting of a bullet, then as a spider I lowered myself by a thread, checking each window.

  “When I come to one window, I feel great hope, for there is Katsuhiro, naked and erect, climbing into bed with a beautiful woman—a woman, too, who I recognize as Teresa, the wife of my friend Adam.”

  Eddie frowns. “Adam, who you swear you saw Katsuhiro murder three nights ago.”

  “Yes.” Anson finishes a partially melted chocolate-nut bar. “That’s right. Now, I have seen much lovemaking, done a lot too, in this long misspent life. I think now I am going to watch the old horizontal bop one more time and resign myself to waiting. Then I notice, though they are careful to conceal it, Teresa and Katsuhiro are talking far more than they are fucking.

  “I wonder why they are so carefully hiding what they say, and, suspicious old coo
t that I am, I study the room until I see that, well hidden above a doorframe, is a video camera lens, situated so that it can record most of what goes on in the room. Evidently, our friend Susano has more audience than just me. Someone is making blue movies of his bedroom performance!”

  Dakar guffaws rudely, but Eddie looks serious.

  “So you couldn’t very well go in and speak with him there, could you? I don’t suppose you overheard what they were talking about?”

  Anson looks cheerfully shamefaced. “I tried, very carefully, I tried, but I only caught a word or two.”

  “Couldn’t you get close?”

  “Eh! You know our impetuous Katsuhiro. Here he is, naked in bed with a woman and trying not to take advantage of her...”

  “Tell me another lie!” Dakar laughs.

  “No, seriously. They put on a good show, but I don’t think...” Anson shrugs. “That is not important. What I am telling you is that I did not care to put my fragile spider body near where Katsuhiro might blot it out with a single blow of his hairy fist.”

  “Good point,” Eddie concedes. “Have his captors hurt him?”

  “Katsuhiro does not seem to have been tortured, but I think he has learned things he does not like. You remember the ‘hospital’ I told you about, eh?”

  The two athanor nod. Neither is likely to forget Anson’s account of the smallpox barracks.

  “I think he must have been shown that—it would explain why he hasn’t escaped. Perhaps his entire island nation is being held hostage against his good behavior.”

  Eddie rubs his head, tugging at the woolly hair as if just remembering how he has been transformed.

  “What can we do then?”

  “We must get Katsuhiro out,” Anson says, “but we should communicate with him first to make certain that he will leave. Then we get him out, both him, I think, and Teresa.”

  “Then kill Regis,” Dakar says, his eyes shining with joy at the thought of his revenge.

  “Unless he is an athanor,” Eddie hedges.

  Dakar snarls something inarticulate, but does not argue.