‘It’s the Sun Temple people,’ said Fiorinda, between chattering teeth. ‘If you were a camper, you’d know. God, I’m so cold. They dug some ground, in a field out along the Oxford road. They t-try to grow pure native food things, fat hen, purslane, beechmast—’
‘Beechmast?’
‘Oh yeah,’ said the driver. ‘Old Sun is in this for the long haul.’
‘But they’re dying of starvation, or they would be if they played fair. None of it grows.’
‘Or if it does the sacred holy slugs eat it.’
‘Like sacred cows in India. Can’t be touched. Sage keeps ent-t-treating them to hear the voice of the Mother, and top themselves. They get really pissed off.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘Well, they are hardline,’ explained Sage. They were in the arena. The word sounds empty, no such luck, it’s a shapeless mediaeval village having a carnival night. He swerved around a trail of people who had not been planning to give way. Maybe they couldn’t believe the van was real. ‘And here is Gaia giving them the clear message, you are dead meat, but they just go down the Organic Grocery van and stock up. Can’t understand it—’
‘Oh, Sage, I am in such a bad way. Oh, doctor, doctor, what do you prescribe?’
‘Cannabis and red wine.’
‘Chocolate.’
‘No chocolate. Chocolate is for Atzecs.’
‘You bastard, you are so full of shit. Sugar. I need sugar.’
‘Think I got some dried apples.’
‘Fuck you. Oranges and bananas.’
‘They don’t grow here, babe.’
‘Yes they do, they do. I’ve s-s-seen them—’
‘Not for fucking long, then. How many times do I have to tell you, ignorant brat, global warming makes this country colder, not warmer—’
‘God, that is so unfair… Hey, Sage, watch out!’
‘Whoops. Hmm. You know, I really shouldn’t be driving—’
‘M-my least favourite Sage remark. Up there with I did not tempt fate, fate tempted me. You should never be driving, you are a menace. Oh, Sage, don’t kill anyone—’
‘I’m not going to kill anyone. No, no, no. Look, they scatter.’ But the van was going round in circles like a vast, lost dodgem car. ‘Ax, have you spotted an exit?’
‘How did you get in?’ said Ax.
‘Can’t remember.’
‘Head for Blue Gate.’
‘That’s what I’m trying to do, man. Only, I have to confess, I can’t strictly see what is presumably out there, in the real world. Not in any clear order.’
‘Stop thinking about it,’ advised Ax. ‘Do it on physical, leave your mind out of it.’
‘Good idea.’
‘Tell me when we’re at the van,’ said Fiorinda suddenly, urgently.
‘She okay, Ax?’
She was not okay. They should not have shifted their attention for a moment, her whole body had gone rigid in his arms. He could feel the cold that gripped her spreading, her lungs filling with icy water. But, thank God, Sage had found his way to an access lane. The van was rumbling through a different darkness, elfin glimmers in humped rows of tents: a thump and a crash as he pulled up.
‘What did you hit? Oh, Sage, you hit something.’
‘Water butt. We’re home. I hope I didn’t run over the annexe.’
‘Where’s the van?’
‘Get a grip, Fiorinda. We are in the van.’
‘Oh. I didn’t know that.’
As she went ahead of them Sage caught Ax’s forearm, and clocked the blood specked weals on the inner side, as if measuring an index of her distress.
‘You’ve seen her like this before,’ said Ax.
‘Couple of times. Not so bad.’
They followed Fiorinda. Sage touched the wall and a pearly radiance spread. Things had been flying about, during Sage’s navigation of the asteroid belt: a lot of unsecured stuff was on the floor. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘Anything breakable in here, I broke it long ago.’
Fiorinda sat on a couch, knees up, arms locked around them, head bowed.
‘Sage, can we handle this?’
‘Oh, yeah. Easy. Administer first aid, talk her down, she’ll be fine.’
Stepping through debris, he opened lockers until he found a bottle of red wine. ‘Fuck, an actual cork. Who bought this? I hate ’em.’ He handed it to Ax. ‘You do it. Ought to be a corkscrew in one of those drawers but I don’t know. This van disappears things as if it was trained by Argentinian paramilitary.’ He pulled a white box from another locker, and advanced on the patient.
‘Fiorinda, gimme a thumb.’
‘What for? I’m all right. I said, I took nothing.’
‘But humour me.’
She gave him her hand, and hid her face again. Sage stood looking down at her, and tapped the implant on his wrist. ‘George… Hi, George. Don’t want anyone near the van tonight. Yeah. Thanks; later.’
‘I have the corkscrew,’ said Ax.
‘Excellent omen. I have the NDogs. We are equipped.’ He took a slim lacquer box from the First Aid, rummaged and selected a handful of poppers.
‘You want some straighten out mix, Ax?’ He slapped a popper against his throat. ‘Mmmph.’
‘What’s in it?’
‘Adrenalin, mostly.’
‘Gimme,’ said Ax; and then, ‘No, wait.’ He was not a hardened NDogs abuser, and those things could be treacherous. Because Aoxomoxoa does it all the time, doesn’t mean anyone else should try. ‘Better not.’
‘You sure?’
‘Me, Teflon head. I’ll stick with what I have, you court cardiac arrest.’
‘Okay, if that’s the way you want to play it.’
‘If you collapse, will your wrist let me get hold of George—?’
‘Course it will. It’ll probably work for hours even if I’m dead… Ah, no. Hey, Ax, I didn’t say that. Come back. Don’t panic, nobody’s going to die.’
‘I am not panicing.’
‘Are you sure you don’t want me to straighten you out?’
‘I’m sure. What about Olwen? Could you get hold of Olwen quickly?’
The skull looked amazed. ‘Why Olwen? What made you think of her?’
‘She’s a doctor of medicine, isn’t she? They have emergency stuff in that tent. And I think Fio likes her.’
‘She was a neurologist, don’t know what you’d call her now. Yeah, she’s on the campground. I scream for help, I think she’d come.’
‘Okay,’ said Ax. ‘We’re sorted, let’s go. Operation serve the princess.’
So this was Sage’s van, this battered, pearly-lit, gaffer-taped moon module, more of a Russian than a NASA ambience. The focus—for quite a while, at the beginning of all this—of Ax’s covert and jealous curiosity. He’d been wrong, he understood that now. Whatever mystery bound Snow White to the giant space cadet and his crew, it was not fuck.
The compartment they were in was already, surely, bigger and squarer than was possible inside a trailer; other spaces beyond, it probably went on forever back there. The windows were jet black, sheets of obsidian. There was a kitchen table, counters with lockers over and under them, couches bolted against the walls. He righted a chair, sat on it and began to roll First Aid spliffs, watching Sage with Fiorinda. He’d taken off her red boots, but she didn’t want to take off the jacket; and indeed it was cool in here. They were muttering about Aztecs and fat hen, the brass buttons on the sailor jacket, are those things meant to be eagles or anchors? keep talking to me, she insists, every few seconds.
When he joined them she sipped a little wine from the glass he put to her lips (her hands were shaking too much for her to hold it); and started to say that she was better—then suddenly dropped to the floor, fists to her mouth, stifling tearless, gasping sobs.
Ax on his knees beside her, trying to hold her, ‘Fiorinda what is it—?’
‘I can’t tell you there’s nothing to tell please don’t be angry, I can’t help this�
��’
‘Why would we be angry? No one’s angry with you—’
But she was gone, incoherent, struggling like a panicked bird. He had to let go, he could see the bones through the flesh of her arms and shoulders, so white and brittle, he was sure he would break something. Sage took over, held her securely, reached left-handed for one of the poppers he’d laid out, checked the code and slapped it against the pulse in her throat.
‘Don’t do that to me!’ she screamed, fighting.
‘Gimme another.’ He took the second popper, did it again. Almost instantly she relaxed: her head drooped, her eyelids closed.
‘What’s that?’
‘Pro. It’s a prostoglandin cocktail: safer than melatonin, it starts a cascade that puts you under, very gentle, unfortunately it may not last.’
‘She hates modern drugs.’
‘I know. But I don’t keep sleeping pills. Let’s get her to bed.’
Sage picked her up and carried her, Ax following, through the van to a room at the end, and laid her on a bed. They covered her up and left. Back in the Heads’ kitchen, the air seemed filled with after-images of her terrified fluttering. Sage checked the screen in the white box.
‘Did she take anything?’
‘Nothing to mention. But you’re always testing for things you know about already… I was wondering about those roses.’
‘What?’
‘Stranger things have happened.’ He closed the box, frowning, and self-administered another dose of straighten-up: shook his head at the stinging hit. ‘How Muslim are you feeling? Got some Chopin in the freezer.’
‘I’ll drink.’
They sat at the table, frosted Polish vodka and shot glasses between them.
‘Is there any chance he could have been at the gig?’
‘Who?’
‘Rufus O’Niall.’
‘I really don’t think so. He definitely wasn’t on my guest list.’
O’Niall had given up on the Seychelles. He’d been in Ireland for the past couple of years, since Dissolutions summer in fact, living in a castle, toying with the idea of playing the ageing celebrity statesman. Thankfully he’d never taken plunge—not overtly, anyway. He was not someone they had to meet.
‘He needn’t have been with the Irish VIP party. He could have slipped into the country privately, and walked in here with the crowds.’
‘He’d have been recognised; and anyway why would he do that? Forget it, Sage. This is about a whole shitload of things that I shouldn’t have let happen. This is not about one sad bastard called Rufus O’Niall.’
‘No?’
‘Come off it. She’s been under incredible strain and she’s vulnerable. People think Fiorinda is hard as nails, they are wrong. She’s not heartless, she’s damaged. Sometimes she’s like someone walking with broken bones—’
‘Agreed. And do you remember how she got to be like that?’
They stared at each other.
‘Well, okay,’ said Ax at last. ‘I admit there are things I’d like to do to him, but it’s no use thinking that way. Nothing is going to change the past. Fiorinda is who she is. She starts from now…Sage,’ He didn’t like the mask’s expression. ‘Lay off. As long as he leaves Fiorinda alone, he’s not our business.’
‘Is that an order?’
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake. Listen, as far as the public record is concerned, he didn’t do anything. Nobody sold the story to the tabloids. Okay, in our world no one is in any doubt of what happened: but that just makes O’Niall a rockstar who fucked a precocious twelve year old, and thoughtlessly got her pregnant. In our world, yours and mine, that’s not a crime. It is disgusting shit behaviour, but it is not a crime. He didn’t know his ex-girlfriend’s sister had set him up with his own daughter. If you want to go after someone, go after Carly Slater—if you can find her. Fiorinda won’t thank you. She doesn’t want that stuff dragged up, you know that’s the last thing she wants.’
Sage downed his vodka, refilled the two glasses. ‘What about the other version? The ugly rumour that says he knew she was his daughter, that’s why he was interested, for some fucking reason, and he was the one who screwed Carly Slater into setting her up?’
‘People will say anything, once the dirt starts flying. As you should know.’
‘As I should know, yeah, thanks… Then who sent the roses? Someone expert at pushing buttons, evidently. Who knows things we don’t know. What if he likes to jerk her chain, remind her, occasionally, that he is in the picture? I don’t think I can stand for that.’
‘You’ve seen her like this before. Any pink roses or postcards from Ireland involved?’
‘Not that I knew about, but—’
Ax slowly shook his head.
‘You think I’m making it up?’
‘I think Rufus O’Niall is not another Pigsty. He has a hateful taste for very young girls, but he is not crazy. He’s not going to go obsessing over his own daughter, when it could make real trouble for him in his new respectable role. He’s a rich, vain, Big Name bastard, with a reputation for bearing a grudge, and he is influential on the government of our most powerful neighbour. I don’t need him for an enemy, I don’t want Fiorinda caught in the crossfire…and even if I believed your ugly rumour, I’d feel the same.’
‘But you’ve thought about it.’
‘I’m stupid enough. I’d like to avenge my lady’s honour, yeah. I’ve thought about it, and decided to forget the idea. I advise you to do the same. Let it go.’
‘What if I don’t want to let it go?’
‘I don’t know why I’m listening to this. Sage, Fiorinda has had very hard times, the scars will be with her for life, and I hate myself for letting her get into this state. But going after O’Niall stinks. It’s not on the agenda and it never will be.’
‘Okay,’ said Sage, after a moment. ‘We drop the subject.’
‘I knew she was on a knife-edge, after Pigsty—’
‘Yeah.’
They sat in silence. Ax watched the beautiful detail of the mask; and looked around the capsule, mildly curious as to why nothing was floating. Sage filled their glasses again.
‘I could get Allie to run over the Irish party’s hotel records, see if any of them ordered any flowers. If it would make you happy.’
‘Nah, leave it. It would be very fucking stupid for us to be caught snooping.’ The skull grimaced horribly. ‘What a shit, eh. How low can we go, holdiong our breath in case the Irish won’t tolerate our eccentric rockstar solution to the CCM. And decide to send a gunboat… You think they enjoyed the show?’
‘The Celtic nation VIPs? I think they were keen to check us out. They find the size of the CCM thing frightening. So do I.’
‘Me too. I have terrible visions. What if all the English decide to leave home an’ join your rock and roll band, Ax? All forty million.’
‘It won’t happen,’ said Ax. ‘Something worse, weirder and totally unexpected will happen instead.’
They laughed and shook their heads. Future shock.
‘You know,’ said Ax. ‘I used to wonder a lot why you hadn’t jumped on her, back in Dissolution Summer; spite of the yellow ribbon. You obviously liked her, and you do jump on women, Sage. You are known for it.’
‘Yeah, well. Sometimes even Aoxomoxoa can tell when he’s not wanted.’
Soon as he spoke Ax knew he’d been tactless. He had a propensity for doing this to his friend, saying what should be left unsaid. But Sage didn’t seem to have noticed. The skull’s blank eyes were staring sombrely into the middle distance.
‘Ah, you’re right. Tonight doesn’t have to have anything to do with O’Niall. To Fiorinda, what’s happened to us looks bad enough: this trap closing around her. Forced to live on when her world’s ended, reduced to the status of a pet animal—’
‘I hate it when she starts that one. That’s such nonsense.’
‘It’s the way she feels, Ax. It’s the future she sees.’
They both looked
up, sharply. Fiorinda was crying.
The trailer’s master bedroom was dark. Sage touched the wall, raising a little light, and there she was, sobbing desolately, face buried, hair a cloud over the pillows—she was like a map spread out, a little country sinking into stormy seas. Ax felt himself grow in scale, he had to be big enough to hold her. He stretched his arms across the miles, the distances, touched her and folded down into the middle dimensions again, into human forms, Ax and Fiorinda: lifted the babe and hugged her, murmuring hey, ssh, I’m here.
Fiorinda stopped crying, stared at him in horror, scrambled to her knees and backed away. ‘Sage! Where’s Ax? Help, come quick, Ax is gone—!’
It was all Sage could do, coaxing and pleading, to talk her down this time. Ax was no help. A moment ago he’d been aware he was seeing himself and Fiorinda as the land and its defences, harmless brain-candy picture language: now his control was gone. The Heads’ cocktail overwhelmed him, he was the monster, this demon his darling saw… He heard their voices, like the thin piping voices of strangers, victims, prey—
‘hey, hey, none of that, it was just a bad dream—’
‘I hate it when nightmares go on when you open your eyes—’
‘Yeah, yeah, me too, worst kind. But it’s okay, you’re in charge. Take over. You’re not going to let a stupid dream push you around.’
‘I take over?’
‘C’mon, you know you can do it. Now, this is Ax. Give me your hands.’
Ax’s eyes were open, but his vision so disturbed he could hardly see. Cold fingers touched his face. ‘Yes,’ she whispered, ‘This feels right. This is my Ax.’
‘Of course it is.’
‘I’m sorry Ax.’ Her face came into focus, blurred as if by rain, ‘Did I frighten you?’
‘Ssh,’ said Ax, holding her. ‘I’m sorry too. Sorry, Sage. Lost it for a moment.’
They hugged each other, all three: Ax and Fiorinda both of them shaking, recovering from a near-miss, things that had almost turned very bad. Another swoop in scale. The wide bed, surrounded by its walls of digital hardware, was hiding the three of them, they little sparkly software people safe in the depths of the machine…
Bold as Love Page 23
