Pomegranates full and fine

by Unknown Author

  Tango forced herself to keep walking, though her heart was suddenly pounding in her chest. Tolly had been supposed to reach the door first so that she would have a chance to watch him go in. Now... she swallowed. It was, she supposed, a miracle that they had gotten this far. She passed the mad vampire and walked up the steps onto the verandah of the old house. There was an old-fashioned doorbell in the center of the door, the kind that you turned to ring. She did so. The door was opened by a handsome blond man with an emotionless face. His body filled the doorway. He looked at her, waiting.

  Was there a password? She hoped not. Some kind of invitation she needed to produce? Tango cursed Tolly silently. The only thing she could think of was the chain bracelet. She held up her left wrist in a vague gesture, one that she could turn into a brush at her hair if she was wrong. The sleeve of her jacket fell back just enough to allow the bracelet to glint in the light that fell over the blond man’s shoulder.

  The man stepped aside, ushering her in. Tango walked past him with a silent sigh of relief.

  A wide staircase with heavy banisters of dark wood soared up almost in front of her. A shadowy hallway ran beside it, leading back into the depths of the house. Past the stairs, she thought. But there was a sprinkling of people standing in the foyer of the big house, and more packing a parlor off to the left. She wasn’t going to be able to slip off unobserved. The blond man gestured her politely in the direction of the parlor. “Good evening, Dr. Tanner. You’ll find the usual refreshments laid out.”

  “Thank you.” She noticed that a few of the people in the foyer glanced away or muttered behind her back as she passed. Apparently Dr. Tanner was not especially popular. That could be good.

  The parlor was a large, pleasant room decorated in a very Victorian style. A fleet of tall glasses full of champagne and a battalion of shorter goblets filled with red wine waited on a table by the door. Tango took a glass of champagne, hoping that Tanner wasn’t a nondrinker. Standing casually, one hand in her pocket in that way that men stood, she surveyed the other people in the parlor.

  There were both men and women present in the gathering, more men than women but not by much. Most of the people were like Tanner: middle-aged, with hair just starting to go gray and faces just beginning to wrinkle. A few had a desperately young look to them, a look of fortunes spent on moisturizers, hair-coloring and facelifts, trying to recover lost youth. Some people in the crowd were older, while others, a very few, were much younger, in their early twenties. One and all, however, were dressed in dark, conservative suits and dresses, as though the style were some kind of uniform. All of the guests were also wearing the dog-clasped chain bracelets. Aside from the bracelets, Tango might have felt that she was indeed at a polite cocktail party or a fundraising event. Instead, the gathering had the air of a secret society.

  She also recognized some of the people. One of the detectives who had taken her statement on last night’s penny murders. A bald young man who looked teasingly familiar but whom she couldn’t quite place, until she remembered the activist who had urged the protesters on College Street into their clash with the police; he looked very different without all of his earrings. A grayhaired television commentator. Matt and Blue, handsome in dark suits, sipping from glasses of a red liquid that Tango doubted was wine. They might have been humans. The two vampires were largely being left alone, as though they were new members to this club

  — Tango noticed that they seemed to be the only ones in the room not wearing chains.. She would have to avoid Matt. Last night he had noticed that there was something unusual about her, though he hadn’t known enough to be able to recognize her as Kithain. He might recognize her oddity again tonight. She turned to wander over toward another part of the parlor... and caught a glimpse of Jubilee Arthurs as he politely declined a canape.

  The words to “Good King Wenceslas” instantly snapped into her mind. The psychic mercenary could penetrate even her shapeshifted disguise easily. She had to avoid him. She turned back toward the end of the room were Matt and Blue stood. At least Matt might not recognize her, even if he did notice something unusual.

  Tolly saved her by choosing that moment finally to make his entrance. He was loud, he was obnoxious, and he was dressed entirely inappropriately. Heads all over the parlor and in the foyer turned to look at the mad vampire. Matt and Blue ran for the door to take charge of him, apologizing profusely to the doorman and dragging Tolly off past the stairs somewhere. In the direction she was supposed to be going, if she could get away from the party. She took the opportunity to move down into the part of the parlor that Matt and Blue had vacated.

  “Tanner!” someone hissed. Tango almost grimaced. Apparently Dr. Tanner wasn’t quite as universally unpopular as she’d hoped. She turned in the direction of the voice. A short, heavy man in a double-breasted suit waved her over. “You’re looking good. Lost weight?” It was the sort of thing someone would say if they hadn’t seen Tanner in some time. Tango felt a little more confident. “Yes. I was sick for a while.” She tapped her throat. “Still got a bit of the bug lingering.”

  “I’ve heard that doctors in children’s hospitals tend to get sick more frequently than usual.”

  “It’s true,” Tango lied. She glanced at the group the short man had been standing with. They were clustered around the young gay activist. “What’s the topic?” “Mouse knows something, but he’s not saying anything directly. Just a lot of hints that Solomon might be behind the penny murders and that that’s going to be the big announcement tonight. Mouse claims he was involved in that riot on Monday.” The short man shuddered. “I almost hope Solomon is behind the murders. At least that way we’re safe, eh?”

  “Absolutely.” Tango took a sip of her champagne. Solomon sounded like the person in charge. If he was, then he was probably the person who had ordered Jubilee to kidnap Riley, And the presence of Miranda’s pack at the party certainly made sense if Solomon was somehow involved with the penny murders. Although in that case, it seemed odd for Matt, Blue and Tolly to be new members to this society, while Miranda was in danger.

  The short man dragged Tango over to a tray of canapes, away from Mouse and his adoring groupies. “Listen, Ian. Some of us are thinking that Solomon might be elevating tonight. We’ve got those new members—” he rolled his eyes “—and if Solomon’s doing an initiation, there’s a pretty good chance he’ll take the opportunity to fill the four empty places in the High Circle.” The short man passed her a canape, dark meaty paste on a little triangle of pale bread.

  “That makes sense.” The short man nodded enthusiastically and popped his canape into his mouth, chewing noisily. Tango considered hers for a moment longer, then took a more cautious bite.

  Tango had eaten a lot-of exotic foods in her travels around the world, and she had found that most meats had a very distinctive flavor. Some she liked, some she didn’t. Cat, no matter how daintily prepared, fell into the latter category. She kept her face calm and forced herself to swallow. The other half of the canape slipped discreetly into the pocket of Dr. Tanner’s jacket. She couldn’t, however, keep herself from drinking the last of her champagne in one mouth-clearing gulp. The short man ate another. She wondered if he knew what they were. “These are different from last time, aren’t they?” she asked him casually.

  He licked his lips and considered it. “Maybe a little more garlic.” He pointed at some square snacks on the tray. “Try the rat. It’s very good tonight.”

  He knew. Tango felt a little ill. “Thanks, but I had some pretty greasy Chinese tonight. I don’t think anything else is going to improve the way it’s sitting.” Matt and Blue reappeared, Tolly tightly hemmed in between them and dressed in a rather ill-fitting suit. His hands and wrists dangled almost an inch below the cuffs of the jacket, although it was hard to tell whether that was the jacket’s fault or his. The other vampires had found their packmate a glass of blood. “I said I want a straw!” Tolly yelped peevishly.

  Polite Toronto manners ass
erting themselves, the guests at the party ignored him this time, though the short man rolled his eyes again. “The other two aren’t bad, but I don’t know how that one managed to get in.” He sipped his champagne. “They put me in mind of that Delara girl. You know, the tall Hispanic one with the incredible hair.” He stretched up, looking around. “I haven’t seen her yet tonight.”

  Miranda? It must be. “Neither have I,” Tango said truthfully.

  The short man shrugged. “Anyway, I just want you to know that we’re rooting for you to be elevated. We think you deserve it.”

  “Thanks.”

  “And if you happen to get Solomon’s attention anytime, maybe you could, you know, put in a word or two for us. Especially me — in light of that thing with the abuse charges, and all.”

  Tango looked at the short man carefully. There was a greedy light in his eyes. “Of course,” Tango said with a smile. “We can’t forget our friends, can we?” She wanted to shove his obsequious face into the canape tray. What kind of secret society was this?

  A single deep chime rang from somewhere upstairs. It was a strong, echoing sound, like iron gates swinging closed. Instantly, everyone in the parlor set down their glasses, dropped their conversations, and turned to file out into the hallway. Tango tensed. She might be able to hide in the parlor and then sneak down the hall past the stairs and look for Riley. There was another door out of the parlor... no, Jubilee was coming from that direction. There were no other good hiding places. She cursed and went with the crowd.

  Out in the foyer, the blond doorman had produced a large wheeled cart like a tea trolley. As the guests left the parlor, he handed them each a full-face mask. Most people received a mask that was solid black, featureless except for eyeholes and a mouth slit. Some people, however, received a decorated mask bright with swirling golden symbols. Tango wondered if these might be the people who belonged to the High Circle that the short man had mentioned. She received a plain black mask, but among those receiving painted masks were the detective, the activist, the commentator and, Tango noticed, Jubilee Arthurs. The vampires received no masks. Fitting the masks to their faces, the guests walked up the broad sweep of the big staircase.

  Tango jockeyed to get into the middle ranks of the crowd. Whatever was going to happen, that seemed like the safest place to be. If she were in the front, she would have no way of knowing how to act; if she were in the back, she would be a straggler. Unfortunately, it did mean that she lost sight of Jubilee and the vampires. The stairs came to a landing, then turned and went up another flight to a broad, square-beamed doorway. The crowd was silent. As the guests passed through the door, each raised their left wrist to their lips, kissed the chain bracelet, then walked on, arm held high. Tango did the same.

  On the far side of the door, she almost stopped. She definitely hesitated, because someone behind her bumped into her. Hastily she resumed walking, but continued to look around with surreptitious awe.

  The entire upstairs of the big house had been gutted. There were no interior walls and no ceiling overhead, just empty space all the way up to the rafters under the roof. Every surface had been painted coal black. The light that came up the stairs and through the door behind her was the only illumination. It didn’t penetrate far. When the doors were shut and the light choked off, it would be like floating in a void. Something shifted in the shadows by a wall. For a moment, Tango thought it was one of the guests. Something shifted again, and she saw the ghostly shape of some huge animal. Heart pounding, she froze, waiting for the thing to lunge at her.

  Then a masked guest passed between her and the apparition. The thing lost its depth, and she realized it was a bas-relief carved in the wood of the wall, the shadows of cultists passing through the door seeming to make it move. Her perception of the relief as an animal was correct, however. It was the image of a huge, heavy-jawed, broad-chested dog. The image marched

  along all of the walls that she could see in the dim light.

  In the center of the huge room was a two-tiered platform. The guests in gold-painted masks were stepping up onto the first tier and turning inward to face the second, empty tier. The other guests were arranging themselves in a broad circle around the platform. The most sought-after places seemed to be in the half-circle that lay between the platform and the doorway. Tango spotted the short man again, standing in that part of the circle, and squeezed in next to him. He scarcely acknowledged her presence. All of his attention was on the platform.

  The doors slammed shut as the last guest found a place in the circle. The room plunged into darkness so absolute that Tango wasn’t even sure her eyes were still open. It stayed dark for what seemed like ages, but couldn’t have been more than a minute. There was the deep chime of iron gates again, and, suddenly, intense white light exploded out of the very air. Tango hissed in shock, blinking her eyes rapidly, trying to regain her vision. When she had, the room was lit normally, though still dimly, once more. Black candles guttered high up amid the rafters. There was a man standing on the second tier of the platform. She was willing to bet that this was the short man’s Solomon.

  The only thing that he had in common with the guests was the color of his clothes. The man wore black. The similarities ended there. Where the guests were, as she had observed, largely middle-aged, the man was young. Young and very handsome — he wore no mask. His skin was tanned. He wore tailored black pants and a black vest, buttoned up but without a shirt underneath. His arms and chest rippled with muscles.

  Earrings shone in one ear, and a gold chain gleamed around his neck. There was a dark tattoo on one exposed shoulder: a dog like those on the walls, but rearing back. Power and charm radiated from him. Tango suspected that to many of those gathered in the circle, he seemed the living symbol of everything that they wanted to be or possibly to possess. Tango saw more, however: subtle clues that experience organized into a larger whole. Solomon was a mage; the blinding white light, possibly his aura of charm and power, was a manifestation of his human magick. She cursed silently.

  Solomon waited a moment, probably until all of the people in the circle had recovered from the light of his appearance, then he raised his left arm into the air. There was a chain bracelet around his left wrist as well, although it seemed strangely tight and flat. Almost like a tattoo, Tango thought, though tattoos didn’t glint like metal. He brought his arm down in a dramatic sweep to kiss the chain. The people in the lower circles imitated him, touching the bracelets to the mouths of their masks. Solomon raised his arm again and led the assembly in a litany. After the first line, Tango stopped speaking behind her mask, frightened horror settling into her.

  I pay homage to Shaftiei.

  I pledge my soul and service to the Sentinel of the Ways,

  The Hungry Guardian Who Watches the Three Ages,

  The Hound of Thorns,

  The One Wrho Waits, the One Who Comes First.

  I will obey his servant in this world. I am Bandog.

  A mage, Tango knew, had to be careful with his magick. Human magick was a manipulation of reality. If people who did not share the mage’s vision of reality witnessed his use of magick, there could be horrible repercussions as normal reality snapped back against the mage and the paradox of his magick. So mages practiced magick subtly. If they wished to use magick openly, they made sure that they were alone, surrounded by other mages... or surrounded by acolytes who, if they didn’t understand the workings of magick, at least understood the possibility of its existence. Sometimes those clusterings of acolytes could turn into cults.

  Especially when the leading mage was one of the unholy, demon'Serving Nephandi.

  She — and Riley, and Tolly — had become involved with a demon-cult. Miranda and Jubilee belonged to it.. .

  Up on the platform, Solomon lowered his hand. “There are those who wish to join the Bandog. Shall we admit them to Shaftiel’s service?”

  “Admit them,” murmured the cultists in response. Tango did her best to speak along with th
em. Her mask might conceal her mouth, but not her silence. As long as she didn’t have to recite an oath pledging her eternal servitude to some unknown entity, she felt relatively safe. “Let them pledge their souls to the Great Hound.” Solomon nodded and clapped his hands once. A baying, like hunting dogs, filled the air. Tango recognized magick at work, but the effect was no less impressive because of that. The doors at the end of the room split open again. Tolly, Matt and Blue came running in. Close behind them was a figure as different from the cultists as Solomon. It was another man, wearing black pants similar to Solomon’s but with his broad chest completely bare. Around his neck was a studded dog collar. He wore a mask as well, but it was sculpted in the shape of a snarling, heavy-jawed dog head. Blond hair showed behind the mask. The doorman. He carried a short whip, and with it, he lashed the vampires forward. The circle of cultists parted to let them through. The vampires paused in a clear space between the outer circle and the platform. The dog-masked doorman took up a station just behind them. Solomon looked down.

  “You have sought out the Bandog. For what reason?” Matt looked back at the Nephandus mage boldly. “We seek to serve Shaftiel,” he replied in a practiced voice.

  “For what reason?”

  “For his glory, for his return. For all of the reasons that a dog serves its master.”

  “A dog must be obedient.” Solomon stepped gracefully down from the high tier of the platform to the lower, and then onto the floor. “Do you know how to show obedience?” He lifted his left arm. Now that he was closer, Tango could see that the glittering chain on his wrist really was a tattoo of some kind. Matt took Solomon’s hand and kissed the chain. For a moment, Tango thought that she saw a mischievous smile flicker on the vampire’s face and that he tried to turn Solomon’s hand to kiss his inner wrist. Solomon resisted however, and said sternly. “That is obedience. But you do not know full obedience.”

  The doorman snapped his whip suddenly across Matt’s back. The vampire gritted his teeth against the pain. “This is the first kiss of obedience,” Solomon told him. The mage pressed Matt’s head back to his wrist. “Recite: I pay homage to Shaftiel.”