Myths of the Fallen City
Page 15
Jamal set his jaw. “Thanks for the timely reminder.”
It was midmorning, and yet the streets of Sarthoon were already crammed thick with drunken revelers. Jamal eyed each man as he passed. Two months ago, he had found himself entangled in a murder plot involving a love goddess. Bliss, of the Fabled Pantheon of Issulthraq, had hundreds of thousands of followers, and Jamal often worried that Bliss might send one of those followers his way. A town like Sarthoon—hundreds of strangers from all over Embhra, all of ill-repute—would have been an excellent place to snip a loose end.
“I have to be honest, Captain, I’m not sure that Sarthoon will be the place for me.”
“Oh, that’s just talks nerving.” Jebrili belched so deeply that he had to struggle to keep from adding his own vomit to the vomit-spackled street. “Let’s get you to the nearest fleshpot. I’ll find you a fluffy woman to share a friendly bed with.”
“No. I’m not interested.”
“What kind of red-blooded man—an Ardhian no less—isn’t interested in a fluffy woman?”
Jamal decided to ignore the seafarer’s racist tone. He stepped close and spoke in a low voice. “Long ago I lost the part of me that is interested in such things.”
“Hmm. Mysterious.” The captain shrugged. “Well, more ladies for me then!”
They weaved their way down one more crowded street; then Jebrili led Jamal through a door that was covered with a stained, perfumed sheet.
“Welcome to Madame Efta’s!” Jebrili bellowed. The seafarer was greeted with squeals of joy. There were other men in the lobby of the brothel, but they were abandoned as every available courtesan hurried to surround Jebrili.
Jamal was pleasantly surprised. The women were not unattractive, which was a roundabout way of saying that only two of them wore eyepatches. The captain generously introduced Jamal, “This is the Singing Swordsman! He’s the greatest singer to have ever swung a sword, and to have come from Ardhia, and to be wearing orange silk pants currently in this brothel!”
The women swarmed like bumblebees between Jamal and Captain Jebrili. A smile crept across Jamal’s face. He couldn’t help it. He closed his eyes as fingers wandered all over him. Pinching and prodding. Scratching and clawing.
Jamal opened his eyes. Clawing?
“Hey!” Jebrili complained. “What about me?”
The entire gaggle of courtesans had Jamal surrounded. Limbs had him boxed in. Fingernails raked across his cheeks. Women snarled and grunted.
Jamal struggled to keep his arms up—to make space between himself and the mass of intertwined bodies. Some of the courtesans were trying to pull his pants down; others were trying to pull his pants up. The two opposing parties created a friction that was not at all pleasurable.
“Get off of me!” Jamal elbowed one woman in the gut.
Another woman hissed at him, “Everywhere and everlasting!”
Jamal could see that her eyes were not her own. ‘Everywhere and everlasting.’ That was something Bliss would say.
“Hey! Efta!” Jebrili roared. “It’s an erotic frenzy. Bring your pepper spray!”
With that the captain leaped into the fray, peeling bodies off of Jamal. He spun one courtesan away, and she tumbled over a table. She emerged holding a chair, which she smashed over the captain’s head. He went down immediately. Some of the women picked up pieces of the broken chair and used them like stakes to stab at the mass of bodies. Jamal couldn’t tell if they were trying to fight off the other women to get closer to him, or if they were trying to hack off pieces of his body so that they could each have one.
A spray of hot liquid spattered across his face, and Jamal thought that one of the women had finally broke open an artery. But then the liquid trickled into his eyes and began burning fiercely. It wasn’t blood at all. It was some sort of weaponized hot sauce.
The courtesans dropped their stakes. They whined and rubbed their eyes. Jamal knew how they felt. Tears streamed down his face. The mass of bodies broke apart, and Jamal sat hard on the floor and waited for his eyes to clear. Finally he saw a stout woman standing before him. She wore a heavy cloth scarf over her nose and mouth. She held a dripping straw broom, which she dunked menacingly into a bucket filled with water and mashed chilis that glowed an unearthly green.
Madame Efta called out to the moaning women, “Have you had enough of my pepper spray? Don’t make me break out my mace.” She patted the handle of a spiked club leaning against her hip.
The moans changed to confused chattering. Then the chattering changed to wails of lamentation. The women crawled to the captain’s supine body. He had a huge splinter of wood stuck in his neck. A puddle of blood was growing wider around his head and shoulders.
“What happened?” a courtesan asked.
One courtesan held out her bloody hands. “What did we do?”
“I was possessed!” Another woman cried. “I swear I was.”
One woman rested Jebrili’s head tenderly on her lap. His blood darkened her pink shift.
“Captain!” Jamal scrambled to the seafarer. “Hold on, Jebrili. You’ll live through this.”
“N-no,” Jebrili sputtered. His face was already as pale as bone. “But that’s all right. I’ll die as I lived. Bleeding and delirious in the arms of a woman I barely know.”
The woman in the pink shift stroked the captain’s head. “My name is Tulip, captain.”
“A-ho. Hello, Tulip.” The light was already fading from Jebrili’s eyes. “Of course I know you…” he coughed. “Did you know that you were always my favorite?”
“Yes,” Tulip said. Tears rolled down her cheeks. “You told me that often.”
The other women were weeping as well. They nodded to each other. “You told all of us that.”
“That’s because… you were all my favorites.” The captain closed his eyes and smiled.
Fresh moans of grief filled the room. Made-up ladies and lonely perverts both wept together.
Captain Jebrili rasped, “Goodbye beautiful world.”
And then he was gone.
After a while the room fell silent. Madame Efta stood over Jamal with her broom dripping greenish liquid.
“I think you better tell me who you are!” she said. “And what it was that put my girls in such a state.”
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Copyright © 2018 James Derry
All Rights Reserved
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, places, or events is entirely coincidental.
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Table of Contents
Map
Prologue
1 – The Conqueror’s New Court
2 – Paean and Suffering
3 – The Gatecrasher
4 – The Rescue Attempt
5 – The Bell Tolls
6 – Dead Bodies
7 – The Deep Down
8 – Mementos
9 – Electricity
10 – The Duel
11 – The Trial
12 – The Road
From the Author
Excerpt from Groundbreakers Book 2