Thorn Boy and Other Dreams of Dark Desire (38 page)

At each hour,
boy priests sing litanies to the goddess and her heavenly
entourage. At the hour after midnight, when only the young priests
are awake, I slipped from my bed, took up the mask and placed it
over my head. I dressed with speed and covered myself with a dark
hooded cloak that I wear to walk through the gardens in the rainy
season. As an afterthought, I clasped around my neck a golden
chain, from which hung a lion’s eye stone, striped dark crimson and
gold. Perhaps instinctively, I sought to provide myself with some
kind of protection.

The temple was
so quiet, and yet I thought I heard in the distance a rumble of
thunder. For a moment, I wondered whether I would ever return there
and such was my excitement that at the time I did not care.

It was as if I
were invisible. I hurried past the open doors, beyond which lay
sleeping servants. I undulated like smoke past guards who lounged
at their posts, their eyes wet slivers that looked only upon
dreams. The gardens were held in a humid caul of air. Lionesses
sprawled beneath the trees, some upon their backs with their paws
curled over their chests. I ran among them and none stirred.
Lightning scratched across the night, but there would be no rain.
The sky was a robe of stars.

Then the
garden wall was before me. I yearned to leap it, but it would not
be necessary. Flights of steps run up to the top of the wall at
regular intervals, so that guards can patrol it or else temple
staff might sit there and watch the life of the city. I chose one
of these flights at random and ran up it, then stood for a while on
the wall, looking down. The city was spread out ahead of me, a mass
of dim glows and hulking shadows. Now I must jump, for there were
no steps on the other side of the wall. It looked so far, yet I
knew it was not. I glanced behind me, fearful for a second that
someone was watching me, but the temple and the gardens were still
and silent, as if enchanted. I drew in my breath and leapt.

I landed on
all fours on the short wiry grass and, for some moments, felt I
should continue my journey in this manner, that I had discarded the
body of a woman altogether. Then I stood up and saw that, yes, I
still had arms and legs and that running on all fours would be both
ungainly and slow. Quickly, I ran to a grove of tamarinds near the
road, which was a glaring pale ribbon in the darkness. The
wilderness was very near. I had only to follow the road for a short
time, then take a narrower track to the east. The wilderness is
always there around us. If people should abandon the city, it would
soon revert to a strange and tangled waste, dry and tough and
desert-coloured.

I had arranged
to meet Arcaran at the edge of the waste, by a forest of broken
towers, which were all that remained of an older city than ours.
Their shattered fingers cast eerie shadows on the ground and I was
sure that ghosts lingered there. For a while I could not find the
magician and ran about in circles among the looming ruins. Then he
stepped out of the shadow of a tower in front of me. He was a
creature of night, yet I could see his face clearly; its sculpted
planes, the faintest breath of dark beard about the jaw.

‘
I am
here,’ I said, ‘where is the prince?’

‘
I have
hidden him in the ruins. I thought you were not coming.’

‘
Take me
to him.’

‘
We must
venture further from the city. We are too close here.’

Prince Reevan
lay with his head resting on a broken column. He looked young and
vulnerable, his eyes staring blankly at the stars. I thought for a
moment that he was dead, then he made a small sound and a thread of
drool fell from his lips. I was alarmed by his condition and knelt
at once to place my hands upon him, but Arcaran cried, ‘No, don’t
touch him.’

‘
Why?’

‘
The
parasite could transfer itself to you. We are not yet
prepared.’

I stood up.
‘Then we should proceed quickly.’

Arcaran lifted
the prince in his arms and began to walk away through the ruins. I
followed, looking about myself. I did not feel afraid or, if I did,
the sensation felt pleasurable. It did not cross my mind that I was
essentially, despite my title and status, a young woman alone with
a strange man far from my sanctuary. I had always believed I was a
goddess, but in truth did I really possess a goddess’ powers? I did
not know how to smite a man if he should attack me. I did not even
know how to defend myself with human strength. Yet there I was,
following him. It seems senseless now.

Beyond the
ruins was a rocky valley, surrounded by high spiky cliffs. We went
down into it and there I saw that a fire had been built and already
lit, flames leaping hungrily at the sky, shedding showers of
sparks.

The magician
laid the prince down on the ground and I awaited the preparations
for what I was convinced would be some arcane ritual. As he
arranged the prince’s limbs, the magician said, ‘I have spent a lot
of time in Mewt, my lady. I have visited the great temples there of
Sekt and of her sister, Purryah, the cat goddess. The priests
revealed to me some of their knowledge. It is a wisdom that never
came here. For a century, your people have had an incomplete belief
system.’

‘
The
original priestess of Sekt in Madramurta was trained by Senu, High
Priestess of Akahana,’ I said. ‘How do you know what we have or
have not learned?’

‘
I know
because you are unaware of what to do now. A true avatar of Sekt
would know.’

‘
And so,
presumably, do you.’

He nodded,
squatting before me, his long, expressive hands dangling between
his knees. ‘I do, and I will tell you, but it may alarm you.’

I stood
stiffly before him, wondering what would be said and whether it
would be true.

‘
You
must expel the breath of Sekt into the boy,’ said the magician.
‘You must conjure it. Do you know how?’

I wanted to
answer that I did. I wanted him to think I was something more than
just a mask, but I couldn’t answer, because I didn’t know.

He ignored my
silence and said, ‘First you must remove your mask.’

‘
No! It
is forbidden. I may only do so when I’m alone. You should know
that.’ But, in my heart, that leap of hope.

He looked at
me steadily. ‘The mask should be removed for certain types of work.
This is one of them. Don’t you know why you are masked?’

‘
Because
I am the goddess and her presence in me has changed me. I am too
terrifying to look upon. I would wither you.’

He laughed
softly. ‘It would take more than that to wither me. Do you think
you are hideous beneath it, a gorgon to turn me to stone?’

Again, I could
not answer. ‘It is the law,’ I said.

He stood up
and came towards me. He drew back the cloak of my hood and put his
fingers against the hard skin of the mask. Beneath it, I burned. It
was I who was turned to stone. ‘I can see your eyes,’ he said. ‘I
can see your mouth. You wear this mask to contain your power. The
high priestess in Akahana wears hers only for state occasions, but
you are bridled here, held back.’

I felt I would
die from suffocation. I could not breathe. The mask constricted me.
I was more aware of its presence than I’d ever been.

‘
Take it
off,’ he said. ‘I am not afraid. Nor should you be. Claim what is
yours, what you’ve never truly had.’

My hands moved
automatically. I had no choice. He took a step back and watched me
as I lifted the mask from my head and shoulders. Immediately, the
wind felt too hot on my skin. My hair was lifted by it. His
expression did not change. I felt exposed, impotent. Was all of my
courage contained within the mask? I had no strength now. He came
towards me, put his hands upon my face. I expelled a cry for his
touch burned me. ‘I know you,’ he said. ‘I have always known
you.’

Some instinct
made me pull away. I glanced down at Prince Reevan and saw that his
entire body was covered in a crawling black smoke. It was as if he
was being devoured by a swarm of insects. The magician’s face
looked black too, yet his eyes burned wildly. They were blue now,
yet surely only a moment ago, they’d been dark?

‘
Don’t
be afraid,’ he said. ‘Accept. You can see now,
truly
see.’

I gulped the
searing air. My eyes were weeping tears of flame. ‘The prince,’ I
managed to burble.

The magician
laughed and with a flick of his hand, made a gesture. ‘The brat
doesn’t matter. He is only a decoy. Watch.’ At once, the enveloping
darkness rose from the prince’s body into the air. He cried out,
his limbs jerked. ‘It is done,’ said the magician. ‘Simple. The
salamander was my creature. I put it there. It was you I wanted. It
was always you.’

I backed away
from him, incapable of thought, of rationalisation.

He stalked me.
‘You people are pathetic,’ he said. ‘You were given a power you
could have developed. You did nothing but lie complacently in the
temple until the power fell asleep from ennui. I can wake it, lady.
It is already mine. I have come for you. Do you understand? For all
it has atrophied, something was created here in Jessapur. I smelled
it. It drew me. You are more than Senu ever could have been, yet
you do not know it.’ He drew himself up to his full height and it
seemed to me as if his flesh was smoking. I could smell charred
meat again. His eyes were smouldering blue flames. ‘Do you know
what I am?’

I knew. Part
of me, a part of me that should have been greater, had always
known. ‘Djinn!’ I said. Hungry, envious of flesh, full of
guile.

‘
They
let me in,’ he said. ‘You let me in. Look at you. A gargoyle. The
mask has more life in it.’

I put my hands
to my face and all I could feel was a frozen snarl, made of ivory.
I had the wedge-shaped muzzle of a cat, a cat’s sharp teeth. If
ever I had been a normal woman, now I truly was a semblance of
Sekt, lioness-headed, a statue made flesh. Hideous. Monstrous. This
was the secret the mask had hidden. Now, the lioness had been
released, but she had no strength. She had been domesticated.

‘
You
have the potential power of the red fire, the white fire,’ said the
magician, ‘that which is stronger than the orange fires of hearth
or altar. You are most powerful free of your mask, lady, but also,
paradoxically, most vulnerable.’

Arcaran made a
sudden movement and grabbed hold of my arms. It was strange because
there was no substance to him. He was smoke, yet I could not escape
him. From the waist down he had transformed into a boiling column
of darkness. He dragged me towards the fire and I could hear the
song of the sparks. The flames leapt higher as if in anticipation.
‘We shall be one,’ he said. ‘I shall have Sekt’s essence. You do
not deserve it.’

He was never
flesh, I can see that now. Even his body was an illusion. He wanted
mine, and the gift of fire that lay slumbering within it. To him, I
was naïve and stupid, a posturing child with no true understanding
of the goddess’ power. Perhaps he saw himself as a denizen of Sekt
and sought to reclaim her, release her. But most of all, he wanted
my body. I knew that when I returned to the temple, I would no
longer be me, and that a prince of djinn would hold sway in the
hallowed precincts. No one would ever guess.

The flames
licked at my clothes. Soon, it would be over. I could not help but
fight, even though I felt my predicament was helpless.

Then she moved
within me. I felt a flexing in my muscles and bones, a great sense
of outrage. A voice roared from my throat. ‘I am Sekt!’

I
breathed in the flames, and expelled them in a gust of blood red
sparks. Arcaran uttered an inhuman scream and fell backwards into
the fire. The leaping hot tongues enwrapped him and he lay there
staring up at me in fury. I snarled at him and he snarled back, but
he was no longer the one in control. ‘Do not presume,’ I growled.
‘Don’t
ever
presume.’

Then I turned
my back on him and put my hands against my face. I was no longer
snarling. I felt pliant flesh, slightly furred. The golden mask
stared up at me from the ground. It was a lifeless thing. I sensed
him move behind me and turned round. He looked like a man again, a
beautiful man, although his long hair was smoking.

‘
You
cannot have this flesh,’ I said. ‘It is mine. I have provenance
over this land.’

‘
Sekt,’
he said, ‘you misunderstand. I sought only to wake you.’

I snarled at
him again. ‘Fool! I know what you sought – a way into my temple,
and thus to create your own reign of fire over the land and its
people.’

‘
It has
already begun,’ he said. ‘You cannot stop it, but should join with
me. Look at this land. It is dying. The divine kings are shorn of
grace and power. My influence smokes through the streets of
Madramarta, inspires its slaves to revolt.’

I shook my
head. ‘You are deluded. You were banished once, because you could
not, or would not, help the people of Jessapur against their
conquerors. You have no true might, only a sneaking creeping
insolence that finds a home only in the hearts of the ignorant and
debased.’

‘
The
greatest changes will always be born in the darkest gutter,’ said
the magician. ‘What happens in a noble court or an enclosed temple
affects only the privileged few. That is not change, but
indulgence.’

‘
Perhaps
there is some truth in your words,’ I said. ‘But now the people
have me. I will serve them here as I serve them in Mewt. I always
will.’