Far below the flying pyramid of light, nothing remained of what Gwyndion believed he had seen. Dried leaves scattered over the ground and the wind cried for its own memory. All that was left were shadows.
In his hotel room in the Borderlands, the Lightcaster waited. She was near, the old bitch was so near he could almost taste her, but he had gorged himself to the point he could barely move. His stench filled the room, he had been forced to defecate in a slop bucket, hot steaming yellow-brown turds that a surly-faced urchin with bruises around both eyes collected daily. Life was fine and sweet; he longed to bite the head off each day. He was filled to bursting with the fear and the anguish he had been feasting on. When he looked in the mirror, he could scarcely believe his appearance. It seemed a long time since he had fed as well as he had at the witch burnings. Gone was his carefully groomed appearance. His face was swollen and discoloured, his hair greasy for lack of pomade, and dried crusts of mucus lined his mouth and eyes.
By day, he sat slumped listlessly against the wall. Flies buzzed around the room, walking over his mouth, eager to be near him. Drawn by his stench, they knocked themselves frantically against his windows, trying to catch his attention. He could hear the squeaking of rats in the streets outside and the screams of the prostitutes as they attempted in vain to shoo them away. Night and day became one. All he hungered for now was the Crone. He held her so rightly, she was in his nostrils, in his dreams. He had never hungered so much for a witch. She had driven him to the brink in his desire. He knew that when she died screaming for release, for forgiveness for her sins, for her black-hearted witchery over the centuries, the ecstasy her death would bring him would be the climax of his career.
And so he waited, feeling his energies beginning to escalate. He could sense the magical work she was attempting to do, her power dulled, diluted, by her grief for her friends. The flies spoke to him in excited noisy chattering, reporting back all they had spied in Shellhome.
He lay on the floor and if he forgot to sleep, it no longer mattered. Snow fell outside his window. The flies should have been killed by the cold, but still they came. Food appeared for him, carried by phantom hands, on mysterious trays, most of which he ignored. He had no appetite for the produce that came from the soil of Eronth. It reeked of the goddess Persephone and all the chlonic goddesses and gods. He sipped from a crystal glass placed near a decanter of spiced red mead. But he needed very little sustenance orally; he was still digesting his recent feast of fear, pain, horror and death.
Outside in the world, beyond the tide of rats lapping against his door, he could sense the numbed and shocked posturings of the Faiaites as they attempted to go about their daily business. They did not realise it was too late. Now they had opened their hearts to the Lightcaster, he would spread through their soul like a virus. He sensed the excited flapping of the Eronth goddesses as they attempted to form in his mind. But he was prepared for them, and wouldn’t allow their beings to materialise, so he blanked them out, gave them no life force. But he did allow the Crone to enter his mind as he sought to familiarise himself with her strengths and weaknesses.
The moons rose and set. ‘Soon!’ the flies assured him in their excited, high-pitched tones. ‘Soon, soon!’ Snowflakes fell as he lay slumped against the wall of the small bedroom. He heard the howl of wolves. Inside him, his blood boiled and his anger simmered at the thought of the stinking witch who still lived in this godforsaken world. Her scent became stronger in his nostrils, the disgusting smell of witch he had come to hate over the centuries. Moons rising, wolves howling. Sniff, sniff. Soon, soon, soon. The hunter sniffing and loving the prey.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I fled, and cry’d out, Death!
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sigh’d
From all her caves, and back resounded DEATH!
— JOHN MILTON, ‘PARADISE LOST’
Earth — the Blue Mountains
Sati perched by the small brick wall in front of the house she knew of old, now renamed Light Vision. Twilight was falling, that delicious, dangerous time when it was easier for beings such as herself to cross. She was in her sparrow form. All the smaller to see you with. As she waited, she kept a beady eye out for predators. There were many dangers to be feared from the bush, from the hostile skies of Earth. Possessing magical powers and shape-changing abilities was no guarantee of safety. She could smell Ishran so near to her that she wanted to weep. It was infuriating that he couldn’t sense her proximity. She watched, shivering in the cold attempting to assess the situation.
Rashka had not yet made an appearance, but Sati was sure she was not too far away. She could be crouched in the shadows, watching the Bluites who lived in this house, assessing their strengths before she killed them. Or perhaps she had tired of her desire for revenge and departed. But Sati knew Rashka had resented being the Glazrmhom from her first breath.
Outside the house a chimney smoked, lights were on in every room as if in defence against whatever terrors lay outside. Every so often, a small white face would press itself to a window and look out at the night. For a heartbeat, Sati thought it was her sister Emma. Once she had lived in this house, this web of stone and wood from which all manner of spiders crawled. But no, Emma was long dead, bless the cold prick of Alecom. Emma, a stinking Bindisore raised on Earth. How Sati hated the memory of her with her cold, arrogant human face. She flinched at the thought of Emma’s disgusting white human body that had swelled so easily with child while Sati, who had perfected magicks that Emma’s fragile Bindisore mind couldn’t have begun to understand, could not conceive a child. Emma’s belly had blown out, disfigured with new life, while Sati’s had remained flat and cold. She thought again of the beautiful young woman she had seen in Faia with her other-wordly poise, with lips so full and tinged with the dark blush of a rose. Maya. Her heart had threatened to burst from her chest when she had realised who she was, and fury had beat a drum inside her head. Diomonna would pay for her double crossing.
Sati forced her mind back to the present. She glanced around, studying the spaces between the shadows. Maya would keep for now. Alecom had revealed her presence to Sati, the Azephim Queen would enjoy destroying the last thing that remained of her sister. It was obvious Khartyn had given her sanctuary as she had also sided with Emma. Why the Crone bothered to protect Emma’s filthy offspring was beyond Sati’s comprehension. Her envy of her dead sister raked again, like a claw scratching her heart. The scent of food frying drifted from the house, and from the ground Sati heard a low, faint growl as if the Earth itself was in pain. Something terrible was happening to this land, she realised. There was something distorted about the view in front of her. She frowned, craning her small sparrow neck, feeling the cold night air tug at her wings, coaxing her into flight.
‘Hunting for worms?’ She started and turned around. The angoli Charmonzhla was perched on the brick wall beside her. He had managed to dress himself in a black tuxedo, his dark hair was plastered to his head, and he had applied two patches of rouge to his cheeks. He looked like a debauched, broken doll. Floating above the wall was the Looz Drem child. Sati remembered her from the Mass they had enacted to call the Phooka. She looked different, not as distinct as she used to be. Her face was puzzled, aged, and she was transparent in places.
‘She’s dying,’ Charmonzhla said, and held his hands to his heart in a mocking gesture of sympathy. ‘Alas! So cruel! Too young to be worm food. She got too close to the light, to the living. They are seducing her into their mouths.’
‘Shut up! Your lies stink like you! I am not dying! I am alive! Alive!’ squealed the girl. But her voice was faint, and filled with static, as if from a broken radio.
Charmonzhla raised his eyebrows at Sati, a smirk on his face as if to saw See? The sparrow Sati wished she had selected a larger body with more intimidating beak and claws that she could menace the angoli with. The stars above them watched in cold detachment. The odour of bacon frying drifted out to them.
�
�They were vegetarians once. Now they eat meat,’ Charmonzhla said, clutching his sides and wheezing as if he had said something funny. He turned to Sati, a smile on his face. ‘Have you come for your worm, little bird? No! Wait! Don’t fly away. Take him if you like. Wait for him forever in your wormy body with your heart beating fast. But fee, fo, fi, fum! I smell the blood that da Glazrmhom come!’ he sang. ‘He has become weak, Dark Queen. He has tasted the juices of too main Bluite women. Naughty as that is, it is not the worst! No! He has placed his kylon inside one of the fallen. He has drunk too much and is watching television.’
‘He was always weak,’ Sati said. ‘That is why he was entranced with one as despicable as you. An angoli!’ she spat the word at him. ‘Not even content to do your own killing, you stand back watching others do your work.’
‘Hurtful words from one who brought a Lightcaster to Eronth,’ he said. His eyes shone, the moon reflected in them.
‘I am not dying! Little Rachel lives!’ the demon hissed.
He turned to her, watching for a second, his wings lurching beneath the back of his suit. ‘You are dying,’ he said, making her scream. ‘I told you not to get too close to them.’ He paused, his face turned up to the sky. ‘Listen! Do you hear?’
Sati did. There was a woman’s scream, the sound of a horn being blown.
‘The Wild Hunt is on the loose!’ Charmonzhla cried. He backflipped off the wall and landed on his feet. ‘Come, Rachel.’ he ordered. ‘Let us fly to see who they are hunting. What sweet sacrifice will the night bring to us?’
‘I don’t want to die!’ Rachel said, still crying. She stamped her foot. ‘I will hold on to life! There can be no end to me!’ Sobbing, she examined her body, where parts seemed to have disappeared.
‘You stink,’ Sati said to her. ‘You fool yourself if you think that what you are now is life, Looz Drem! One of the demon dead!’ But she spoke to air, because the pair had disappeared. The horn sounded again and Sati cocked her head to listen. There was no mistaking the chilling sound that seemed to rip and wound the air. The Wild Hunt was on the move. The Azephim Queen could sense the thrill of terror that ran across the darkening scrub like a bushfire. The animals, energies and ghosts of the bush were moving quickly, terrified they were the prey the Hunt was searching for. The shadows leapt wildly, hoping to escape with the wind beyond the moon. The horn blew again, and Sati had to resist the temptation to fly and observe the sport. Now was her chance with Charmonzhla gone, and no sign of Rashka, to attempt to convince Ishran to leave with her.
She flew to one of the lit windows, nearly gagging on the stench of Bluite, and looked in. Her beady sparrow eyes pressed against the leadlight windows with their square glass patches of red, pink and green. The room looked inviting and cosy. A small fire burnt in the hearth. Sati had once known this room well. She had used it often, until she discovered other, more convenient portals through which she could slip between worlds. It had changed since the days her sister had lived here. The present owners had painted the walls shocking red. Careless licks of paint spattered onto the floorboards like trails of arterial blood. Magazines and books were flung carelessly about, dead flowers wilted in cracked vases, and spider webs decorated the corners. A pallid, heavy atmosphere seemed to drip from the ceilings. Sati knew some things never changed in this room, however. Above the fireplace was the small oil painting by Johanna Develle, of a woman’s body with the head of an owl. The picture was entitled, The Ancestor, A Self-Portrait. Just seeing the painted head again made Sati snarl, because it brought back memories of her hated sister Emma. She longed to fly into the room and attack the portrait’s mocking eyes.
She looked eagerly for the mural. There it was, its colours still undefined, still unfinished, thank Alecom. She could just make out the serene meadows, the Triple Moons, ilkamas. The paintwork was beginning to crack. Sati narrowed her eyes; it would not last forever. Like everything created on this planet, it would not always exist in its pure original form. She heard muttered voices in the room and looked for the source, adrenaline beginning to pump through her body. There were two Bluite women silting on a faded floral couch, eating noodles from bowls. The television squawked and flashed its radiation upon them as they sat, one eye on the sedating box, their attention weak, fragmented, Sati frowned. Something was wrong here. The girls’ movements seemed artificial, posed. She disliked the way they sat in front of the mural, as if protecting it. She listened to wisps of their conversation,
‘She’s always wanted him. I knew that. Pathetic twit. I just never thought Lazariel would be mad enough to go for her.’
The younger girl put down her bowl and flicked through a magazine. She had a pretty face but it was marred by bruises and scratches. Her lips were swollen, and her blonde hair hacked short. ‘He goes for anything,’ she said. ‘Can’t keep his dick in his pants. He doesn’t even seem to care what he’s got it into.’
‘Typical man,’ the older woman said. She glanced around the room uneasily. The younger girl watched her. ‘Ever since the night of the ritual. Those things that came here.’
‘Don’t!’ the woman said. ‘Don’t talk about them, you’ll bring them back. Can’t you feel it tonight? Can’t you feel them?’ She glanced towards the window and Sati ducked out of sight.
The young girl smiled into the darkness and Sati tensed, ready to fly. She felt confused, something was wrong here. Something had happened to these people. But what? If Ishran had used their bodies they should have been insane, or dead. On the surface everything appeared normal, but it wasn’t.
There was a ripping sound from the mural, a soft breathing, and a shadow emerged from the painting. Wet, and newly arrived, the Crossa threw up his arms, leered horribly at the females with a large purple tongue lolling from his mouth and then vanished. The women continued their stilted conversation without pause. Clearly they were used to the travellers that used the portal to cross worlds. Their eyes were glazed, accepting. How many were coming through? Sati wondered. Demons, Solumbi, gods and goddesses; thought patterns both malevolent and angelic, crossing back to Earth in search of their original creators.
As if in answer to her question, another ripping sound came from the mural. A faint roar in Sati’s ears like the cry of an ocean, the tenuous pounding of a heartbeat, and then a large Erinnyes hurled herself through the wall. Shadow, plaster, paint, and the caress of a nightmare. A nightmare with talons and feathers, dampened and sticking to her back from the journey she had undertaken. Eyes that held all secrets of death and time flicked around the room, taking everything in.
The females ignored her, glancing up without interest before they returned to flicking through their magazines. They were accustomed to such beings, Sati realised, and the thought chilled her. They did not even react to the foul stench of the creature. The Erinnyes sniffed out Sati’s presence, but the sparrow Azephim Queen held no threat for her. She disappeared like the previous being with a croak of triumph. Once again, the blonde girl glanced towards Sati’s windowpane with a sly smile on her face, and uneasy, Sati decided to try another window.
A short flight took Sati to a small lit window opening on an upstairs bedroom. The house now appeared to be moving, shimmering in the dusk. It smelt of stale rain, and hopes, of decay and mould. Sati glided through the twilight like a large moth, approaching that lit window. She knew with certainty what lay beneath its glowing lure.
When she first spotted him, lying on his bed, his dark hair spread out around him, the longing for him spread through every cell of her small feathered body. The Ghormho, her mate, her life. They had crossed worlds together, they had explored nightclubs where men dressed as women, they had watched small children perform pornographic acts for patrons in seedy bars, they had sipped from each other’s veins and killed in dark, cobbled laneways, writhing greedily at the throats and bodies of their prey while nonjudgmental shadows watched. Ishran, the Ghormho, who understood feather and bone, beak and heart. Who, like her, had claimed the sky as his ow
n. The night had belonged to them, but they had also owned the day. He had moved his body inside hers for so long, thrusting, thirsting, praying to Alecom for the child he could not conceive. He had found no fire of life within her, only a dark winter of coldness and silence.
Petrified by grief and longing, Sati clung to the windowpane. The room was rumpled with stale air, neglect and decay. The bedsheets looked unwashed. Clothes were thrown over the floor. She could recognise black leather pants, the special turtlenecks that he had made up by the seamstresses of Eronth to accommodate his wings. But there were also clothes she did not recognise, fabric reminders of a life that she no longer shared.
On a chipped dressing table, cream candles flickered in wax-dripped holders. There was a small pile of money. Bluite money. Ishran loved to sneer at its foul smell and value, but at the same time enjoyed collecting it. Next to the money was a bulky black Bible and a clump of golden hair resting on top of the book. A large bone, mantled with feasting flies, covered most of the dressing table. She sniffed with her beak, attempting to assess if the bone and hair were Bluite. It was not unusual for Ishran to collect small trophies from his kills. Power objects or mementos as he liked to refer to them. The object could be as small as a button, or as graphic as an entire head, which he sometimes preserved in his laboratory. But it had never been in his character to leave these mementos lying casually in his bedroom. Normally he liked to keep them in books and jars, in tiny beautifully decorated antique wooden boxes. Hidden away, private, where he could spend hours playing with them, enjoying a secret communion. Now he lay on the bed, eyes open, staring at the ceiling. A small fly, unnoticed, explored his hand, making a curious trek of the hairs and scales on his hands, the jewellery, the bone rings, the long dark varnished nails. Among the Bluite surroundings, Ishran looked small, vulnerable, and somehow wrong. A noise came from the darkening bushland behind her, the unmistakable sound of a hunting horn. A pause, then what Sati took for the howl of a wolf. Did wolves exist in the Australian bush? She could not remember, and strained her ears to hear. Another silence. Then the piercing sound of a woman’s scream.
A Fire in the Shell: Circle of Nine Trilogy 3 Page 25
