Mélusine (61 page)

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Authors: Sarah Monette

BOOK: Mélusine
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I cannot speak; I know that if I make any move toward the owl-eyed man, I will let the anger in. And I know that it will get in anyway. It is stronger than I am; it always has been. There is no way out, no end, no peace. I rock forward slightly and slam my head back against the wall, again and again, trying to kill the anger, to deaden my own raw nerves, my hurting mind. Again and again, until there are hands, too many hands, and the anger falls in on me and I am gone.
Mildmay
I kept walking in the Three Serenities. Thamuris muttered horrible things about the Celebrant Lunar but wouldn't tell me why, and I figured she hadn't listened to him. Maybe I'd been right about the laudanum. The prick was still the prick, but at least he didn't bring no more tour groups to gawk at me. And he still wouldn't say nothing about Felix except, "Fine," and even when I couldn't stand it no more and said, "I fucking well know you're lying," he turned a double septad different shades of red, but he didn't change his story, and I couldn't make him.

Then we hit a cold snap, the way you do sometimes in early spring, and, Kethe, it was like my entire leg was made of glass and razor blades. I got out of bed one morning and found myself on the floor. Just like that. I mean, I didn't even have time to realize I was going down, just there I was on the floor with my leg singing grand opera and a whole new crop of bruises starting up along my hip and forearm. I managed to get myself back onto the bed before the prick came in, but it was a fucking near-run thing, and I really think it was only hearing his footsteps in the hall that let me do it.

"It's the weather," he said, before he'd even closed the door behind him, and I bit down hard on my lower lip and didn't say to him what Felix had said to me once, Your command of the obvious is awe-inspiring.
"The celebrants say you shouldn't go out. Your leg isn't ready for it, and you might slip. So stay put." He smacked the breakfast tray down on the table like it might wander off, and left. I swear I felt the door slamming in my leg. I listened to his footsteps, listened to the hall door slam, and then said through my teeth, "All right, Milly-Fox, you big sissy," and got up again.
This time I stayed up, got to the table, sat down more or less under control, and just about puked at the thought of trying to eat. But I had something I wanted to do, and it wasn't stay in here all day, either. I choked down what I could, although everything tasted like glue and ashes, and then I got up again—and I wasn't enjoying it no more for the practice—and went over to the door.
I listened for a moment, purely from habit—I knew they'd made sure to give the murderer a hallway all to himself—then opened the door.
I reminded myself that I still wasn't doing anything wrong, and stood there and thought about my breathing until I believed it and had furthermore remembered that I didn't give a rat's ass anyway.
"They got you whipped, Milly-Fox," I said to myself, and turned left.
I had to take it in stages, with the water closet as my first goal, then a windowsill wide enough I could sit on it for a while, and then the door at the end of the hall. By the time I got there, my leg felt like a red-hot wire running through a pile of old masonry, but I told it to shut up—and I ain't saying nothing about how I felt when I realized I'd said it out loud—and took a good careful stare at the lock.
Even with the leg, I felt a little bit like my luck had turned. They kept it in nice shape and everything, but it was old, made for the kind of key you could use to knock out a burglar. I'd been afraid Troian locks would be seriously hot shit, all weird and fancy, but this one was practically screaming to be picked. Find something to use as a lock pick and I could get out of this jail and go find Felix.
But for now I knew I was going to be lucky to get back to the room without ending up on the floor. "Later," I said to the lock and started back down the hall.
It took me like indictions, but I was still upright when I came back through my door. I made it to the chair by the window and basically fell into it, and then I sat there for a long time thinking about my breathing and about not crying and not puking and not passing out. After a while I felt like I could open my eyes again, and then I sat there and looked out at the Three Serenities and worried about Felix and my leg and most anything else that crossed my mind. It ain't no good way to pass the time, which I guess explains why I was actually glad to hear the hall door open sometime in the early afternoon.
Feet came briskly down the hall, and I was just thinking, Funny, that don't
sound
like—when somebody knocked at my door, which the prick never did.
Powers. For a moment I couldn't even think what to do. Then I remembered and croaked out, "Come in," in Troian like a crow somebody'd trained to talk.
The door opened. It was the good-looking guy from the Three Serenities. I might have known. "Astyanax," I said.

It unnerved him, which was good. He said, "Good afternoon," in Midlander, but it came out sounding way more like a kid and way less snotty than he'd wanted. He shut the door and took the other armchair, buying himself time and probably hoping I'd say something stupid and give him the upper hand. I sat and watched him and didn't say nothing.

He had his fair share of brass. Once he was settled, he said, perfectly cool, "I have been sent to ask you a few questions."
"Okay," I said. "Who sent you?"
"I beg your pardon?"
I said it again.
"The Celebrants Terrestrial. I am empowered to use any means necessary to get answers."
"Most folks start by asking."
I got under his skin with that one. Well, it's always annoying when you make a threat, and the guy on the other end of it don't seem to care, so I can't blame him for that. He got a little red along the cheekbones and snapped out, "We need to know more about the Mirador."
"Why don't you ask Felix?"
If I'd pinked him the first time, this time I'd gotten in a real cut. I'd mostly been fishing for information, but if it pissed him off, too, I was okay with that.
"Our reasons are no concern of yours," he said, and I knew what that meant. Any questions they asked Felix, they were just getting that stare back, the one that said there wasn't nobody home, and even if there was, they weren't answering the door. Felix wasn't "fine," which, I mean, I'd already known, but now I had some actual proof. Well, I had a snotty-voiced sidestep, but it was good enough for me.
After a moment, Astyanax figured out I wasn't going to lob him one, and said, all tight and angry, "What do you know about the Mirador?"
I kind of shrugged. "Not much."
He gave me the hairy eyeball, but he wasn't very good at it. And he could hex me blue, and I still wouldn't care.
"What do you
want
?"
It wasn't a real question, but I didn't care about that, neither. "See my brother."
"What?"
"I want to see my brother."
"Oh, I'm sure you do. Do you think we're idiots?"
"What?"
"We know what you did to him."
"What I…
what
?"

"What you did to him," he said, like he thought I was so stupid I hadn't understood him the first time.

"I didn't do
nothing
to him!"
"Oh really? And the bruises were caused by what? Falling out of bed?"
"It was a shipwreck! Things got a little rough."
"Yes, of course." But he didn't believe me, and I knew I couldn't convince him—anybody—not without Felix… and then I remembered crawling onto the beach, dragging Felix, swearing at him, the look on his face, and it hit me that by now Felix might think I was a monster just like the Troians did.
I kept myself together—didn't want this smug asshole watching while I lost it. Just took a breath and put it aside. And waited for Astyanax to make the next move.
"Tell me about the Mirador," he said through his teeth.
"And what do I get out of it?"
"Surely you want to help your brother." I wanted to belt him across the face for that, for the nasty sneer and the snotty tone, but it wouldn't help, and I'd fall down if I tried.
"I want to see him first, so I know I
am
helping."
He was done with it right then: stood up, said, "I don't know why I expected any better from a common murderer," and left. He slammed the door almost as hard as the prick did.
They double-teamed me that night, him and the prick. And they were mad as two wet cats in a sack about it, and that was some comfort.
I was laying in bed when they came in. Not sleeping—don't be stupid. Just laying there staring up at the ceiling and worrying about Felix until it felt like my head was going to split.
I heard the hall door open, and thought, Oh fuck what now? Two sets of footsteps, the door opened, and this huge ball of witchlight, a sort of nasty crimson-pink color that I don't think was an accident, sprang up in the middle of the ceiling like a chandelier. Astyanax said, "You thought you'd gotten rid of me, didn't you?"
"A guy can dream," I said. I didn't turn my head. I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of even looking at him.
The prick said, "You
must
answer the celebrants' questions."
"Or what? You'll kill me? Throw me out on my ear?"
"I thought you were worried about your brother," the prick said, and something in his voice told me he didn't know what the celebrants thought I'd done, and Astyanax hadn't told him.
"I don't say nothing 'til I've seen him. That's my price."
"You're my witness, Khrysogonos," Astyanax said, and I did turn my head then, at the tight triumph in his voice. "I have been empowered to use any means necessary, and you can't deny he's being intransigent."

"But, Astyanax, shouldn't we…"

And that fucker Astyanax cast a spell on me.
It hurt in a completely different way than my leg. I imagine that spell is what being pressed to death feels like, and I'm here to say it ain't the way you want to go. I lay there and couldn't hardly breathe, and I could hear Astyanax asking questions and my voice kind of gasping out answers, and I couldn't do nothing about it—couldn't keep the words back, couldn't take a real breath, couldn't fucking move. My head had kind of fallen back to center—along of the weight, I think, but I ain't rightly sure—so I just had to lay there and stare at the ceiling, and feel the tears rolling down my cheekbones from the sheer stupid pain of it.
He was asking about how come Felix had gone mad. I wanted to tell him I didn't fucking know—that
nobody
knew—but the spell smashed me flat, and I heard myself say, "Virtu."
"Virtue?" Astyanax said.
"Virtu. Big globe-thing in the Mirador. Hocus-stuff."
"And what does it have to do with Felix going mad?"
"Broke it," I said, and, Kethe, even a dumb annemer like me knew there was more to it than that, but Astyanax didn't give me time to say so.
"Of course!" he said. "Destruction, the release of energy—it all makes sense."
"Wait!" I said, because there was more to it than that, and I did want them to help Felix, and they needed all the facts.
"You can tell me more about the Virtu?" he said, and the damn spell squashed a "no" out of me, 'cause I couldn't. I didn't know fuck-all about the Virtu.
"I thought not. No wonder you were trying to bluff. Come on, Khrysogonos. Diokletian's waiting."
"I should… should…"
"Oh by the Tetrarchs, you are a fool! All right, stay with your murderer. But don't expect you can come whining around for the credit later."
"Of course not," the prick said in a mutter.
Astyanax lifted his spell. I didn't want to give him anything, but I couldn't do nothing about the way I was breathing. "Thank you," he said, in that snotty mocking way that I pretty much wanted to kill him for. "You have been very helpful."
"Fuck off," I said.
"As you wish," he said and left. He didn't slam the door this time, but closed it perfectly politely, mild as a lamb. Yeah, he was all milk and honey once he'd got what he wanted.
I lay there and panted like I'd been on the wrong end of a five-on-one fight, and my eyes blurred and stung.
"I'm sorry," a voice said from near the door. "I'm so sorry. He shouldn't have done that."

I turned my head. He was standing there all hunched up in the corner, with his eyes as big as bell-wheels. "Why didn't you stop him, then?" I said.

"I can't. I'm not a wizard."
"Oh. No wonder they made you look after me."
"Yes," said Khrysogonos.
Felix
The creatures around me have terrible heads, snouted and slavering, their eyes gleaming lurid yellow, and horrid, batlike wings that trail the floor behind them with a ghastly ticking sound as their talons brush the stones. I cannot block my ears; I cannot move, and the anger beating its wings about my ears cannot find its way in. They drag me up off the bed, half carry, half drag me out of the room. I have never been out of this room, not since I drowned, and I don't want to go. It isn't safe. But the monsters don't care what I want, any more than they care about the salt water steaming against their clothes. They are too hot, unnaturally hot—or perhaps it is just that I am so dreadfully cold.
They bring me to a room, clean, well lit, but with a table in the middle, a table with straps. I remember that I drowned before, drowned in darkness, and I remember the table. The snake and the corpse and the gray pig: I see them around the table, faint ghosts, smirking at me.
I want to run, but I can't even twitch my fingers. I can't turn my head away, and I am afraid to shut my eyes. The monsters lift me onto the table, tug my limbs straight, fasten the straps. I shut my eyes as tears run down toward my ears. I am doomed, doomed. Malkar will hurt me; Lorenzo will hurt me; Keeper will rise from the sea, and he will kill me at last. There are fingers on my temples, burning me; I can feel the fire catching in the bones of my skull, raging against the salt water, coursing down my spine, my arms, my legs, gathering like red-hot coals in the knuckles of my fingers. I open my eyes and I see nothing; there is nothing left, nothing but molten darkness. I am gone.

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