The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure (24 page)

‘Of course, only I knew there was no danger. It was necessary, this visit. It will prove to the Hegemony I’m right. I bear no malice about the incident. In Ashmael’s place, I’d have done the same, as I would in yours. I never underestimate my most valued hara. It is what makes them special.’

‘I couldn’t kill Pell, but that doesn’t make it right, what you’re doing.’

‘Save your opinions until you have witnessed his return,’ Thiede said, ‘then you may talk to me of whether I’m right or wrong.’

‘But why let him die only to do this? Why didn’t you just take him from Saltrock with you and train him yourself?’

Thiede laughed softly. ‘Oh, Seel, do you seek to pry my secrets from me? I’ll tell you this. I incepted Pell, and he became part of me because of it, but not a big enough part. I was prepared for his death…’

‘Because you arranged it?’ Seel snapped. ‘That’s barbaric.’

Thiede didn’t respond to the question. ‘I was able to net the essence of his being in… let’s call it transit. You must appreciate that I have access to advanced technology, the like of which has not seen on this world before. The
sedim,
for example. The incubation pod you saw in Pell’s room is from the same origin. It will take time, but eventually, Pellaz will be in the condition to accept more of my life essence, not through blood, or through aruna, but something more. He will become more than any other har.’

‘More than you?’

‘I wouldn’t go
that
far. Wraeththu need something, or somehar, to bind them. They need a figurehead, a divine ruler. I am making one for them.’

‘Did Pell have a choice about it?’

‘Unfortunately, no. He will resent that for a time, I expect.’

‘I’m weak. I should have killed him when I had the chance.’

‘Don’t delude yourself,’ Thiede said in a sharper tone. ‘Pellaz wants to live, as all living creatures do. He just can’t help it. It’s a biological imperative. Thankfully, he’ll retain no memory of your murderous impulses. He will never know you saw him in that state.’

‘Take me back to Saltrock,’ Seel said. ‘You’ve got what you wanted.’

‘Indeed I have. You will visit Immanion soon to see the house I’ve had built for you. I expect you to move in within a month. You will be pleased to know I’ve allocated a
sedu
to you. Your training in controlling it begins in two days’ time. I’ll send a teacher to Saltrock with the animal.’

‘We’re all your puppets,’ Seel said angrily. ‘We are all hanging in pods, hooked up to pipes, breathing fluid. I can’t fight you, Thiede, but I have your measure.’

‘Good. I wouldn’t expect anything less of you.’ Thiede put an arm around Seel’s shoulder and began to lead him up the corridor.

Seel glanced back once at the door. He felt numb.

Chapter Thirteen

The gods came to Flick at any time of day or night. He would be walking in the hills, and a name would come to him. One time, as he watched a flight of birds erupt from the canopy of trees and spiral, screeching, into the sky, he heard in his mind the name Miyacala, and an image came to him of a tall, white-haired har, whose eyes were milky blind, but whose forehead burned with a silver star. Flick knew then that Miyacala needed no physical eyes to see, for his sight was of the psychic kind. He was a god of initiation and magic, and those hara who studied and honed their skills walked in the prints of his sacred feet.

One night, as Itzama lay beside Flick, breathing softly in sleep, and Flick��s body ached for a release that Itzama could never give it, he saw a black deity, with serpentine hair, whose eyes were burning red. He was a fearsome god, and he reigned over life, aruna and death. His name was Aruhani and he could smite as quickly as he could bless.

The third god that came to Flick was Lunil, a creature of the moon, whose skin was blue and whose hair was a smoke of stars. These were the dehara, harish gods.

Sometimes, Flick dreamed of returning to the world of Wraeththu, coming like a prophet with a sacred text to inspire and enlighten. Then he asked himself: why should anyone listen to what he had to say? It was his own imaginings, and his pantheon was personal. If he went to Seel with his creations, Seel would only scoff, and the imagined humiliation of this made Flick’s face burn. But mythologies continued to pour from his mind and occasionally he would catch brief glimpses of spirit faces among the trees, or hiding amid the rocks. He heard their voices in the rill of the stream, in the cry of birds and in the wind in the mesquites. There were no more dreams of Pellaz, but perhaps he too had become a god. Pellaz, god of martyrs.

There was no need to write any of this down, because once Flick had a thought, it stayed with him. It was as if he’d known these imagined entities all his life and had always respected and honoured them. Itzama told him that certain god forms recurred throughout every human culture, therefore it was no surprise that Wraeththu should have their own. ‘They are not Wraeththu’s, they are mine,’ Flick said, and realised he was uncertain he wanted anyhar else to believe in them.

Sometimes, Flick remembered that the Hostling of Bones had told him he would train for a year and a day, and when this recollection came to him, he always pushed it away. He did not want his life to change again – not yet. He did not love Itzama, even though the man was handsome, kind and devoted. It was pointless to fall in love, because Flick knew that they would not be together for long. With experimentation, they had devised ways to enjoy physical intimacy, but it was not aruna. Itzama derived more pleasure from it than Flick did. Despite this, they had a companionable relationship and there was an easiness between them that Flick had not experienced before.

Itzama never revealed his background, and Flick often wondered whether he was an outcast and had committed a crime. He could not imagine why else such a sociable creature would choose to live alone. On the night of visions, he’d spoken briefly and vaguely about having been called to this place, but he would not expand upon it. He’d implied he wasn’t quite human, but Flick saw no evidence to the contrary. There was definitely a secret, but on the few occasions Flick tried to press the matter – the best time, he discovered, was after sex – Itzama was not merely vague. It seemed as if he himself didn’t know the answers. Maybe, he’d suffered an injury in the past that had affected his memory. One time he said, ‘When you leave, then I will go too,’ and Flick thought, not without discomfort, that Itzama meant to accompany him. He knew that one day he would have to return to the world of Wraeththu in one way or another and he couldn’t take Itzama there, not as a human.

‘You would have to be incepted,’ he said, rather abruptly, and Itzama stared at him with a confused expression on his face.

‘No,’ he said at last. ‘I didn’t mean that. When you leave this place, I will leave it too, because I think you are the only thing that anchors me here.’

‘Where will you go?’

‘Where I came from,’ Itzama replied. ‘The place I have forgotten.’

‘There is no future for you if you remain human,’ Flick said. ‘Perhaps you should consider inception. It seems such a waste if you just grow old and die. You are too beautiful for that.’

Itzama only smiled and Flick sensed the man did not believe he would grow old and die. He was never around during the day, and it did cross Flick’s mind that Itzama might be a ghost after all, but how could a ghost have a living body? Whatever the truth of the matter was, Flick and Itzama had an understanding, and eventually Flick did not even ask questions. They were living outside the real world, where the strange and perplexing were the natural order.

When nearly a year had passed, Itzama reminded Flick of what he had learned in his visionquest. ‘You must speak with the dead,’ he said. ‘Remember what you were told.’

Flick didn’t want to be reminded of this, because it meant he would have to make decisions about the future. Also, he had no desire to talk to someone dead. It would all be in his head, or a product of one of Itzama’s hallucinogenic concoctions, and Flick was hardly eager to find out what his mind would conjure up. At the very least, it would be Pellaz, uttering further impenetrable riddles. ‘This is my life now,’ Flick said. ‘Here with you. Learning. Magic. It’s all I want. I’m not yet ready for changes.’

‘It cannot be,’ Itzama said. ‘You cannot receive all this knowledge and then keep it yourself. It belongs to your people. The shaman goes into the otherworld to help his tribe. This is your duty. You have your gods, now you must communicate with them.’

‘No one can call up the dead,’ Flick said. ‘I don’t believe in it.’

Itzama smiled his slow lazy smile. ‘The shaman can do anything if he has a suitable source of power. You have one, so use it.’

On the appointed night, to keep Itzama quiet rather than to please himself, Flick killed a large rabbit. He carried it to a small ritual site he used among the stones and tumbling waters of the stream near the cave. There was an area where the water flattened out and ran more smoothly in a wide shallow pool beneath an overhang. Here, Flick drained the body of the rabbit of blood and collected it in a bowl. The moon burned fat above him and the North Star was a god’s jewel in the sky. Shadows were like velvet, and the undergrowth rattled as if shaken by spirit hands. There was a presence to the air, but perhaps this was because of what he was doing. It felt primitive and powerful, a primal rite from the dawn of time.

Flick lit a fire and stood before it. He wore only, wrapped around his loins, the skin of a coyote, which had been given to him by Itzama. He loosed his hair and held his arms to the sky. Now, he must do it. Now, he must believe. He would call upon one of the deities he had named. In his mind, he saw Aruhani, his braided hair like snakes. This was not a comfortable image, for Aruhani was capricious and sometimes sly. But he was the god of life, sex and death, so the most appropriate in this instance. Flick concentrated on the image in his head. He tried to feel the deity as well as see him. He took a deep breath and called, ‘Aruhani, I call you! Come to me now, in the name of the Aghama, the principle of creation! I command you! I bring blood as an offering. Hear me and approach!’

Flick’s heart was beating fast. When he opened his eyes, the whole night seemed tinged a reddish-purple and a high-pitched hum vibrated on the edge of his perception. He poured a little of the blood into the folding ripples of the stream and in the bright moonlight saw its black streak spread out and slip away. Flick dropped to his knees beside the water, his hair hanging forward to wave upon the current, black as blood. He gazed at the glittering depths and then was compelled to jump to his feet. He ran out into the stream, beneath the dark shadows of the overhanging rocks and he danced in the water. He chanted the name of Aruhani, spinning round faster and faster, sending up a spray of sparkling motes. Itzama had told him that magic without a source of power was not magic at all, but simply a game, a play, a deceit. He had to feel the power, really feel it, before continuing, because otherwise it would be pointless, an empty rite. He spun round until he felt he was about to collapse into the water, then flung himself onto the bank of the stream.

Lying on his stomach, he said, ‘Aruhani, open my eyes that I might see. Open my ears that I might hear. Open my heart that I may sense the dead approach, open my mouth that my voice will be heard beyond the realm of this earth.’

The night had become still, listening to him. Even the splash of the water was quieter. Flick hauled himself to his feet and went to sit beside his fire. He threw some sage wood into it. Sparks sizzled up towards the moon and the astringent smell of the herb filled the air. Flick held out his hands to the flames. He should feel cold, but he didn’t. When he spoke again, his voice sounded lower in tone; it vibrated in his chest. ‘Aruhani, come forth to me. Give strength to my hands that I shall be strong, that I may keep the dead within my power.’

He then took up the bowl of blood and spilled it over the earth. Black blood. Slick and shining, like the blood down the stairs, as ancient as the hand print over the doorframe, as sweet as the smell in the Nayati that morning, when the sun came through the windows in precise perfect rays and a white arm dangled down. Flick swallowed thickly. He must not think this, he mustn’t. The images would be too terrible. Aruhani was with him, but the dehar was not a creature of sweetness. He had fangs and claws and his shadow was long. Flick closed his eyes again. He had to speak. His hands dangled between his knees.

‘I conjure you, creature of darkness. I summon you, creature of spirit. I summon and call you forth from the abode of darkness. I evoke you from your resting-place in the caves of the earth. I summon your eyes to behold the brightness of my fire, which is the fire of life. I evoke you from your resting-place. I summon your ears to hear my words. Come forth, dead spirit, who might speak with me. Come forth in the name of Aruhani, dehar of life and death, whose word binds you. I command you to come forth.’

He could hear the crackle of the fire, smell the sage, mixed with the scent of burning charcoal. He could taste blood in the back of his throat, so he must open his eyes now. He must.

Orien sat on the other side of the fire, smiling mildly. His tawny hair escaped his braid in soft tendrils, as it always had. He did not appear remotely dead. Flick was so surprised he scrabbled backwards, and yet wasn’t this what he’d worked for and believed in? Did he trust himself so little?

Orien put his head to one side, but said nothing. There was a sadness in his eyes, which Flick thought might be pity.

‘Speak!’ Flick managed to say. From this moment, his entire life had changed. He should be driven insane by what he saw before him, but it wasn’t frightening at all. That was the strangest thing. Perhaps Itzama had fed him some drug and he hadn’t realised it.

‘You have come a long way,’ Orien said.

‘Not as far as you,’ Flick said. ‘Can you remember, Orien? Can you remember what happened?’

‘You were nearly there, but the diversion was perfect. The last of the human tribes called the shaman here, but they went away and you found him.’

‘What do you mean? Itzama?’

‘The people of this land were a very ancient race. When Wraeththu came, the wisest among them called upon an ancestor of strong magic to aid them. They called him forth from the past, they danced the spirit dance to call him. But they were driven away before he came, so he had no purpose, until you.’

‘Itzama isn’t a ghost, but he isn’t exactly
real
either,’ Flick said, to himself rather than Orien. ‘He is never around during the day. Where does he go?’

‘You cannot see an ancestor spirit in sunlight,’ Orien said. ‘There is a purpose to everything. You must go back. You carve the words from stone, but they already exist in stone. Aruhani is a stone book in the library that no one ever wrote before. You have written him and read him. He has taken your mentor, Itzama, back into himself, to release him from his bondage to this world. He has served the dehara in giving you his knowledge.’

‘Has he been taken already?’

‘It is time now for what will happen next.’

‘Orien, do you know me?’

‘You missed the message, in the air, in the clouds. You walked passed it. But it is time now. There is something to be brought forth, but it is in need of nurturing. It is a secret, hidden. One of many, but this one is yours, even if it is not yours alone.’

He looked beautiful, serene as he’d ever been, but Flick knew that Orien could not really see him. Orien was only a perfect shadow. He could never
be
again. He wasn’t answering questions; he was a spirit with a message, no more than an image programmed by the energy of a god. But perhaps there were some questions he would answer, namely the ones Flick was supposed to ask. ‘Should I go back to Saltrock, or to the settlement I passed?’ he asked. ‘I command you to tell me.’

‘The birthplace of Pellaz Cevarro, that is the place. It is the fountainhead.’

‘Thank you,’ Flick said. ‘I release you. Go in peace.’

Flick didn’t even blink, but in a splinter of a second, Orien was no longer there. He might never have been there, and from the moment he vanished, Flick began to doubt what he’d seen and heard. But at the same time he knew it was the most real experience he’d ever gone through. He had seen the image of his dead friend. He could have reached out and touched him, but, if he had, Orien would have broken apart like a reflection in a pool.