The Glass Mountains (22 page)

“I’ll take one of your dogs here if you’re short of currency.”
 

Moor handed him a tiny gem, one so small it was barely more than a speck.
 

“What is this, I can hardly see it,” said Penn. He squinted as he moved his head in and out from his hand.
 

“This is the low price I promised you,” said Moor. “As you well know, it’s a higher price than most would pay you for the same ride.”
 

“You’ve taken advantage of my good nature, but I’m willing to give you another chance.” He handed us a small metal plate that contained a few symbols on it. “This is my contact card. If you need a ride in the future, let me know.”
 

We stood aside with the dogs while Penn drove off. I examined the metal plate. “What is this?”
 

“You don’t know? You stick it into the contactor and he answers on the other end. He’ll pay the minimal cost.”
 

“Oh, my brother used to tell me of such things. My brother knew everything about Artroro and what a paradise it is.”
 

Moor didn’t respond. I looked at the world of flowers around me and thought of how I’d made it to Artroro, the most powerful sector on the planet, the sector of Maruk’s, and by extension of my own, dreams. But instead of strongmen, each more amazing than the next, I saw crowd upon crowd of people who blended each into the other.
 

Moor pulled on my arm, and I rushed to keep up.

2

We walked into a decrepit wooden reception room. A woman with hair as pale as her pale skin pulled back her lips and bared her teeth and gums in an attempt at a smile. “Need a room? We’re almost booked up, but we have some very nice accommodations left. Four of you?”
 

“Two,” said Moor.
 

“Two and two dogs. That’s four.”
 

“Then the dogs will sleep outside.”
 

“What if someone steals them?” I said.
 

“Whoever steals these dogs will have their hands full,” Moor said.
 

The woman never stopped smiling. “They can sleep in the room for only a small fee, if the lady would like. They can sleep outside for a smaller fee, if the gentleman would like.”
 

“We’ll pay the larger fee,” I said.
 

“Ah, the lady is new to Artroro. Perhaps she would like a tour.”
 

“They’ll sleep outside and we won’t pay,” said Moor. “We’ll pay only for a bed for ourselves.”
 

“Ah, the gentleman has visited Artroro before. In that case, perhaps he would like a driver to show the lady the sights. We can provide that as well.”
 

“Just the bed,” said Moor. “And a private room.”
 

“A private room! That changes everything. In that case, the dogs won’t be bothering other customers. So I will be able to charge you the smaller fee I’d promised you for having them sleep outside. Only now they may sleep inside for that same low fee.”
 

“As I said, they’ll sleep outside. They’re used to it.”
 

“Moor,” I said. “Everyone here seems anxious to possess and acquire. The dogs must be safe.”
 

The woman leaned over the counter to me, so that her face was so close to mine she became blurry. I instinctively leaned back, but my feet remained stuck where they were. There was something hypnotic about the fervent greed in her eyes. Never had I seen anyone so completely focused. As she exhaled, her clammy breath filled the air I breathed. “I must tell you, the price I’m talking about is a pittance. I can see you’re a lady whose heart would break if something happened to her dogs. A most generous and kind-hearted lady. You can save yourself a great deal of worry by paying a pittance.” She leaned even closer, so that I could feel the hairs on her nose brush the tip of my nose. “When I say a pittance, I mean it sincerely. If your friend here cares for your feelings, he will understand.” Her eyes glanced at Moor.
 

I knew she was a swindler. Still, what she said made sense. I turned with annoyance to Moor. “What about my feelings?” I said.
 

He took my arm and pulled me aside. “I think I should handle all negotiations for a while.”
 

“But my feelings,” I said. “She said that if you cared about my feelings, then, ah, what did she say?”
 

“No one else who sees you sees Mariska, as I do. They see a young woman whose only purpose in life is to provide them with fees and jewels. They see someone as easy to rob from as a ground crawler is to step on. The dogs will sleep outside.”
 

“Then I will sleep outside with them.”
 

“If that’s what you wish.”
 

“I don’t like all this frankness after all. I would prefer more lies in this supposed romance. Perhaps rudeness isn’t the most efficacious way to begin a friendship such as this.”
 

“The dogs must stay outside.”
 

“I’ve slept outside many times myself. I will sleep outside tonight. If you want to join me, you’re welcome.”
 

“The Bakshami have a fine strong will, but couldn’t they put it to better use? The woman has no morals.”
 

“She may have no morals, but what she says is true. For a pittance we can make sure the dogs are safe.”
 

“I can assure you that knowing how badly you want this, she’ll charge more than a pittance. I must insist I do all the negotiating from now on.”
 

“Not where my dogs are concerned.”
 

He angrily returned to the woman, who still hadn’t stopped smiling. “We’ve decided the dogs will sleep outside.”
 

Her smile collapsed momentarily, but then it became even more expansive. “Good, good, dogs belong outside, I don’t want fleas in my rooms. I was only worried about the young lady. As a matter of fact she reminds me of my daughter, and as such, I can make some extra efforts on her behalf. For complete payment in advance you may keep your dogs in the room for free.”
 

Moor paid her a fee. “Where is the room?”
 

She shrewdly but very quickly glanced at the small payment he’d handed her. “The best room available is the one for you. I tell you it’s the best! Out and turn left. The room has a blue door.”
 

“And how will we open the lock?” said Moor.
 

“Lock! We have no locks. There is no danger. We’re not like some other establishments which I won’t name but which are located just down the street from here. You’ve chosen your accommodations well.” Someone else walked in behind us. “Welcome! Please. Tell me how I can help you. The best room for you?” With one of her hands she shooed us away, never taking her eyes off the new customer.
 

Moor brought the dogs into the blue-doored room. Something scurried across the floor, and so many bugs climbed up one wall it seemed the wall was alive. The bed slanted precariously to one side and also down at the head.
 

“Wouldn’t it be better for us to sleep outside?”
 

“It isn’t allowed except in certain areas.”
 

“How can it not be allowed to sleep outside?”
 

“Because those who make the laws prefer that you sleep inside.”
 

“Such absurdity!”
 

We sat on the bed, each feeling great annoyance with the other. Now and then a bug would lose its footing and fall from above. A bug fell beside me, and then crawled over my leg before falling off the bed and to the floor.
 

“What did we pay for this room?” I said.
 

“Next to nothing.”
 

“It’s worth less.”
 

“Anything less would be free.”
 

“It’s worth less even than that. Why don’t they pay us?”
 

“Good idea, perhaps you
should
negotiate for us next time.”
 

There was a silence, and then he rubbed and pushed at his eyes and temples and took big breaths of air. I thought he might cry if he could—but he could not. I put my small hand on his large one.
 

And there in that infested room, with the blood rushing to our heads and the bugs dropping to the ground with soft pings, Moor and I copulated repeatedly in the same avid way I’d witnessed among animals. For me this uproar between my thighs was something new, something I had not known existed despite all my mother’s teachings about breeding. At first Moor conducted himself with the same mix of responsiveness and harshness with which he lived, and it seemed to me that this was all something he’d done as often as he’d thrown a knife. But after a while, with my legs wet and sticky and my lips raw from the harshness of our kisses, I knew there was much about this—about me—that was unlike anything even Moor had ever known. In our lovemaking he became not more experienced, but more innocent. At one point pain rose from inside of me alongside desire, but the pain was a part of the ritual of first copulation, the way, when the first of their parents died, some Bakshami would play the rhythms all night, until their fingers blistered from holding the sticks and the noise reverberated in their heads and their fatigue made them clumsy. The next day, exhausted, they nevertheless would feel deeply satisfied that their parent was really and truly dead, and that after this tragic yet inevitable departure from their daily lives the world had somehow righted itself again. Without the ritual there would be no feeling of rightness. So toward the end of our lovemaking, with every time Moor moved within me, the pain increased, and at the same time I emerged from this pain with a feeling of profound satisfaction and a sense that my insensible world had started to right itself.
 

When Moor fell asleep I rubbed against his skin as I had the other night, with a new sense of discovery based on my new experiences. I also felt the way I did when I petted my dogs most evenings and marveled at what wonderful dogs they were and at how lucky I was to have them. Though they were supposedly my slaves, each night when I combed them free of fleas I vowed that I would be their slave for as long as they lived. Being their slave had made each of them mine. We had opened a passage between us through which our desires, our dignity, and our trust might flow. Tonight Moor and I had opened the same passage between ourselves. This made the dogs seem less important, and made it easy for me to see the wonder rather than the hopelessness of this room of moving walls.
 

Moor had barely slept in the short time we’d traveled together. Holding his body I could tell he slept deeply now and that he could hear no sounds from the waking world except those heard through the filter of dreams. Perhaps the soft rustle of thousands of crawling insects sounded like the tinkle of tree leaves in the distance, and perhaps the occasional angry shouts from outside were the calls of desire he’d heard such a short time ago.
 

Within my sleepiness I felt an excitement that wouldn’t let me sleep. To be here, in this place, was not to achieve bliss but to achieve an enchantment of my soul that paradoxically felt still and clamorous at the same time. In this gloomy room that should have been a place of sadness, I clung to Moor and wished we could stay in this village for a long while, exploring Artroro by day and each other by night.
 

Finally I fell into a deep dreamless sleep. I began to rise out of it with an awful feeling similar to one that used to come over me as I was growing up and going through a period of intense dreaming. I would think, If I don’t get up now, my brother (or my sister, or my parents, or Artie) will die. Now I felt I had to get up or Moor would die. I felt as if I were suffocating. My sleep felt like chains I was trying to break free from. I awoke with a jerk and sat up immediately. Night had fallen, but electric lights leaked into the room with a sort of dead quality, an unnatural quality. This light was trying to mimic daylight but couldn’t.
 

The shouts from outside had died down, and the inn had grown so quiet I could scarcely believe that throngs had crowded the village paths earlier. I went to the window and pulled aside the drapes. The view was obscured somewhat by a smoky quality to the window. I tapped the window, but it didn’t ring as glass did. The electric lights cast a queer and exotic luster on anything reflective outside. Shadows fell unnaturally, colors lost their vibrancy, and the unliving and the living seemed hardly different at all. The lights that were situated low enough threw shadows up rather than to the ground, which was the natural place of shadows. And the trees seemed more lifeless than during the day; on the other hand, the buildings seemed to possess a mystery I associated with life. These awful lights! They lit up not just the walls but the corners, not just Artroro but, seemingly, the sky above the sector, as well.
 

“What do you see?” Moor had gotten up and spoke from the bed.