by R. E. Vance
“More so than most humans.”
“Have I been loved?”
Again Astarte nods. “Your people love their king.”
“They do not know me any more than I know the gods.” A dribble of wine stains his white beard deep crimson. “Have I been loved?” he asks again.
“Yes,” Astarte says. “I have loved you. And Enkidu—he, too, loved you.”
“Good,” Gilgamesh says, putting his glass on the table.
There is a long silence before Astarte works up the courage to ask what is in her heart. She looks into the fire and says quietly, “Have I been loved?”
Gilgamesh does not answer. His silence cuts her deeply. Still, she is Astarte, the demigoddess of lust, the queen of succubi and the wife to the greatest king the world has ever known. She is not one to give up easily. With a more determined tone she asks, “Do you love me?”
Still there is silence, and what was once hurt is now anger. She turns to face him, seeking to ask the question again, but is stopped by what she sees.
Her king, her lover, her husband—is dead.
Such is the way of mortals, she thinks. A single tear runs down her cheek.
↔
The death of Gilgamesh is felt everywhere in the world. Kings and princes, creatures of magic and gods offer their respect and their condolences. But respect and condolence do not bring one back from the dead, nor do they soothe the grief of those left behind.
With pity in their eyes and sincerity in their hearts, each and every one of them tells Astarte what a great man he is … was. They touch her shoulder and tell her all the right things a grieving widow needs to hear. None of it makes her feel any better. With every praise, every kindness, an ache stabs her heart that was once impervious to pain.
The priests perform their rites: incense is burned, prayers are chanted, the body is wrapped in a shroud and placed within the stone coffin sitting in the center of a grand catacomb. Here Gilgamesh shall lay, until his body turns to dust.
He will not be alone. Astarte shall sit by his side. Forever, if need be. After all, her body does not need food or water, sleep or shelter.
And so, with the fortitude of a god and the constitution of one deeply in love, she sits.
↔
Astarte kneels by Gilgamesh’s grave, mourning. She knows that she is not waiting for anything. There is nothing to wait for.
A long time has passed since he died. Her lover, her husband. Her friend. Now that he is dead, he will never come back. She knows that. The First Laws will not allow it.
She sits and curses the memories that crowd her mind. She wishes that they were not so strong, so vivid. It’s no use. It’s the way of her kind—to remember every detail, every smell, every touch, every taste, every sound. That is what tortures her. She relives the tightening of her throat and the racing of her heart she felt when they embraced. She recalls, again and again, the joy she knew when seeing him wake in the morning—a waking that will never happen again.
Every memory comes exactly as before, with no possibility to mend a mistake, no hope to right a wrong. No chance to forget her husband whom she loved so much. All she can do is sit by his grave and mourn—alone forever.
Years and years go by. Still, the humans come to offer their respect to Gilgamesh. They burn incense he cannot smell, bestow gifts he cannot use, leave gold he cannot spend.
None of them speak to her, mistaking the demigoddess for a statue.
↔
One night, Astarte hears the thud of falling bodies—the tomb’s guards dropping unconscious. Magic, she thinks. Then she sees the creature that walks into the tomb and knows she is wrong. It was not magic that felled them. It was poison.
Astarte does not look up from her eternal vigil. She does not move, her hand resting on cold stone—worn and warm from her touch.
The figure approaches and hisses, “Astarte.”
Medusa, Astarte knows, although she does nothing to acknowledge the gorgon’s presence.
“Astarte, I’ve come to …” Medusa’s voice trails off.
There is movement in the tomb as the gorgon slithers about, touching things. Gilgamesh’s things. Astarte considers reprimanding Medusa, considers telling her to keep her scaly hands off her lover’s possessions. But what is the point? Her lover is dead. What does he need his things for anyway? Let the gorgon fiddle with them. Let her touch things that are not hers. Let her steal the whole damn tomb! It does not matter!
Not anymore.
The gorgon does not take anything. Instead, she lights a candle and puts it on Gilgamesh’s tomb. Then she gets on her knees and folds her hands in the way humans do when praying.
Kneeling beside her, Astarte can see that Medusa is crying. Still, she does not move, does not speak. She does nothing but rest her hand on her lover’s stone casket.
After a moment, Medusa wipes away her tears and stands. “He’s dead,” she says. Astarte knows she is not talking about her Gilgamesh. She is talking about someone else.
“He’s dead,” the gorgon repeats. “Just like Athena said. ‘Live as a human. Die as a human.’ And now, my little boy … my Chrysaor is dead.”
Medusa turns to leave the tomb and, as if unsure that she wants to go on, stops at the threshold that separates the world of the living from the world of the dead. Then, taking a single step, she stands with one foot on the side of life and the other on the side of death, and says, “I’ve always believed that we had nothing in common. But death has proven me a fool.”
With that, she steps outside.
↔
Astarte continues to kneel by the grave of the man she loved. It has been years since the gorgon visited. She has been still for so long, she does not know if she is alive. Those who visit her lover’s tomb think her a lifeless totem built to honor their dead king. In a way they are right.
Her finger constantly caresses the cold stone. Not that the mortals see this. They are so distracted by the ostentatious tributes in this room that they do not see the only tribute that matters: her devotion to Gilgamesh.
His acolytes bring him gifts to honor their once great king. Even after many years, they still cry with genuine misery as they approach the tomb with their paltry offerings.
There is no doubt—they love him as Astarte loves him. Or rather, loved him. For how can one love a corpse? They cannot. She knows this. Just like her, they love the memory of him. But unlike her, they will die—and with their death, their memories of him will die, too. Soon all who once knew him will be gone. And with their passing, her beloved Gilgamesh will be forgotten.
To be forgotten is to die again.
Astarte will not forget, but nor will she love again. To do so would be her death, and that is something she will not abide. She rises and takes the pendant that Gilgamesh once gave her … oh, so long ago … and places it on his tomb. Love, she thinks, is pain. Love is torture. Love is something I shall never allow myself to feel again.
Now lust, on the other hand …
Chapter 1
What the What?
My life isn’t that exciting. I swear. Usually my days are filled with running the hotel and with dispelling the daily drama that seems to follow Others around. Occasionally I have to teach the virtue of dental hygiene or the necessity of wearing clothes—especially when they happen to be giants with epic appendages flapping about. There are also times when I have to deal with Internet scams, having conversations that go like this:
“No, Penemue, the prince of Nigeria has not bequeathed you a small fortune.”
“Are you sure, Human Jean-Luc? The Queen of Sheba was a personal friend of mine. Perhaps she left me something in her will …”
I’ve also brainstormed ways to merge their cultures with our own. I’ve helped minotaurs string up mazes made of bed sheets just so they could feel at home. I’ve ordered doll furniture and built birdhouses for pixies. I’ve stapled eggshell cartons and mattresses to bedroom walls just so that banshees could scream in
peace.
I’ve ordered brass lamps for genies.
There is no end to Others’ eccentricities—and why should there be? They are, after all, refugees on Earth, their cultures older than agriculture and as plentiful as grains of sand on a beach. And although swaddling seven-foot-tall mummies so they can get some sleep may sound strange, it’s pretty harmless stuff when you get down to it.
Then I have days like today.
In the past twenty-four hours a cosmetic company called Being Human threatened to close my business, my hotel was nearly destroyed by an apocalypse accidentally set off by a peacock-feathered asshole of an Other, my date was arrested and I myself was a fugitive from the law. I’d also been beaten up by a balloon demon, a rancor, a giant and an extremely hairy man.
And let’s not forget the giant, squid-like creature in the ocean.
At least I’d managed to get out of that bright white tuxedo that would have been embarrassing to wear at a 1950s “Under the Sea” dance.
But now I stood before not one, but two peacock-feathered pompous BisMarks—and that was something I could not forgive. I didn’t like either of them, and two was two too many.
The BisMarks stood face-to-face, identical in every way, except that the previously frozen one was dressed like Poseidon—a toga, a coral crown and shell decor. The other BisMark wore his peacock-feathered suit with the unapologetic dignity of a used car salesman—which is to say, guilty.
The Poseidon BisMark growled at his impersonator. “You!” he cawed. Hell, even the human soldiers who had no idea what was going on startled at The Real BisMark’s bark.
The Fake BisMark put an innocent hand on his chest. “Who, me?”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said. “The old impersonation routine. Come on! That’s the biggest cliché in the book.”
The Fake BisMark narrowed his gaze at me. “Bold words, coming from the guy who used the same trick to get out of the salon.” He was referring to Astarte and me switching clothes with Sally and EightBall to trick the Others into pursuing the wrong offenders.
“Touché,” I conceded.
For a moment I thought that The Fake BisMark was going to play to the end by pulling the old “I’m The Real BisMark,” “No, I am” quarrel. He didn’t. Staring at the two identical Others, I knew that there could be no mistaking who was real and who was not. The BisMark—the real The BisMark—exuded an aura of authority, confidence and, what’s more, responsibility.
The fake one had confidence, sure, but he lacked that intangible quality of authority that was innate to The Real BisMark.
The Fake BisMark must have known he had lost. He snapped his fingers, and cloven feet appeared, then a bushy tail. Slowly he transformed into a bad Halloween-costume version of the Devil. A satyr.
Or rather, the Satyr—Pan. He was just as all the stories described him. Half goat, half human—all boy. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Endymion, Jitterbug Perfume and the epic Disney cartoon series Gargoyles—they all got it right. And why not? With an ego like Pan’s, he probably played muse to those writers just to inspire their desire to write about him.
When the gods left, we all expected Pan to make an appearance sooner or later. From everything we knew about him, Pan was the one Other bound to cause mischief. Governments monitored all the media channels and the Internet, examining every audacious act, looking for the trickster Other. He never appeared, and it was assumed that he had died during the GrandExodus, the darkness of the closing heavens and hells consuming him before he could escape.
Apparently, we were wrong.
Pan strutted around the stage with an arrogant showmanship, indulging the crowd. He wanted to be the center of attention, needed to be. Seeing the joy he got from having all the eyes of the world on him, I knew that there was simply no way that he could have spent the last few thousand years of his life in hiding. The only mystery that remained was why it took him so long to reveal himself in the GoneGod world.
“You!” The Real BisMark cried out again, this time the word carrying far more than a simple accusation. It was also a question demanding to know what this whole thing was about.
“Time,” Pan said, twirling Poseidon’s trident like a baton. “This is the greatest time heist of all history.” He pointed the trident at the crowd. “I must have gotten—what? Five thousand years? Maybe ten.”
“And how much time did you spend doing all this?” I asked.
“Hey!” he said in mock hurt, “you’ve got to spend time to get time. If you must know, I spent no time freezing Tiamat.” He stuck his hand in the crystal vat and pulled out an apple-sized red ruby.
“The third Eye of the Gorgon,” I said.
Medusa nodded.
“I didn’t have to spend much time. The Eye of the Gorgon took care of most of that and what magic I did need to use … well, I used theirs,” Pan said, pointing Poseidon’s trident at the crowd.
The BisMark shook his head. “What exactly do you plan to do with her?”
We all looked at Tiamat, who stood frozen a mile off the shoreline of Paradise Lot.
“Her … she shall remain there, a reminder to the world that the great Pan still exists. From now until the end of time, humans and Others alike will stare at the monster and know that Pan is the only real god now.”
“Except,” The BisMark said, “you’ll have to continue holding the creature, hour after hour, to keep her in a state of suspended animation. Is that your plan? Stay on this beach forever?”
“No,” Greg said, pulling back his hood like some cheesy villain. “Not as long as I have this.” He pointed at the crystal vat. “You see, that crystal … it’s a Creation Crystal, and it’s hooked up to a generator and laptop. the Crystal is an amplifier, and as long as it channels time through the Eye of the Gorgon, she will remain frozen. It’s what is holding her. I have encrypted the laptop so that only I know the password. So … here’s the deal. You keep giving us time, and we’ll use half of it to keep her still. Stop giving us time and … well … crack goes Tiamat.”
So that was the play. Steal a bunch of time from the Others, then blackmail them for more. “Can that work?” I asked. I reached in my pocket, but Pan pointed the trident at me. “Relax, O great and powerful Pan. If I’m going to die, I want to smell minty fresh.” I held up one of the sticks of gum Medusa gave me before unwrapping it and biting down.
The BisMark shook his head in disgust. “Vain human,” he said.
“That’s me.” I gave him a big, gum-filled grin. “Now, if you don’t mind answering this vain human’s question— Will what Pan says work?”
The BisMark nodded and Pan danced at this, like he had just won the game. Then he patted the crystal vat. “Seeing how this is a Creation Crystal, I’ll be able to fuse my being with that time. At this rate, I’ll live forever.”
Atargatis’ eyes brimmed with anguish. “And what about my daughter? My Champion?” she asked.
“What? Her?” Pan pointed at Tiamat. “She’ll stay like that, unless you want me to … you know …” He made a cutting gesture.
Atargatis shook her head and started crying. Astarte stepped forward and put a comforting hand on her sister’s shoulder, hugging her with a tenderness I’d rarely seen the succubus exhibit before.
“You betrayed me,” The BisMark said to Stewart, evidently more upset by the fact that he had been crossed than by the giant frozen monster in the water. Priorities—we all got ’em.
“I did,” Stewart said, with all the enthusiasm of a houseplant.
“For what?”
“When the gods left, everyone was freed—except me. Why? Because my master happened to be the one god that was never a god at all.”
The BisMark’s eyes crackled with fury. “So you sought to destroy the world?”
Stewart looked back at Tiamat. “The Crystal will hold her for as long as the gems are upon it. For as long as the bearer wishes it, the beast will remain stone.”
“Do you really think I
will allow you to leave here and be free? That will never happen. Not after this. As for you …” The BisMark sneered at Pan. “There are no amused gods to protect you. No places for you to slither under. You’ll be dealt with by the appropriate measures of the GoneGod world. Mortal law.”
“No … No! … NO!” Pan said, with what seemed like genuine lamentation. That was until his cries turned from anguish to mockery. His eyes were glowing again. “Alas … how can I live with myself? Oh … yes. I can. See that helicopter over there? My co-conspirators and I are going to board it. Don’t interfere, or the human Greg will turn off the machine and free the beast.”
“What about me?” Michael said. “Do you think I’ll let you go?”
Pan snickered. “Of course not. But I now possess five thousand years I didn’t have before. How many of those do I have to burn to hold you down for a few minutes? A year? Two at the most.” Pan’s eyes pulsed with electrical illumination, and from the sand emerged a giant hand which grabbed the archangel. “There … as for you, young whippersnappers—” Pan pointed at the Army, and with a flick of his wrist turned their weapons into giant bananas, complete with the Fairtrade stickers.
While Pan was distracted by his little magic tricks, I whispered to The BisMark, “What do you need to hold Tiamat yourself?”
“The Eye, and Poseidon’s trident. If I were to possess both, I could hold her for a short while.”
“What’s a short while?”
“An hour, maybe two.”
That would have to do. I couldn’t let Pan escape and continue to take time that wasn’t his, nor could I let that monster run rampant. We did have one advantage that Pan hadn’t considered: The world was allied neither to Nature nor Chaos; in this ambiguous state, Tiamat could be turned back. I was sure. I just didn’t know how.
The way I saw it, although a couple hours wasn’t a lot of time, it was a lot of motivation for one of these older-than-sin creatures to find a way. So before Pan could turn his attention to anyone else, I leapt. The plan was to knock him over and to kick him in his goat testicles. Then, once he was down, to keep him down. I landed, and Stewart lifted one of his damned diamond hands. One of his gargoyles charged at me. It was the good ol’ ScarFace.
