'Well, there's your answer.'
'Lupus is… something else.'
Zizi's gaze softened. 'Tell me about him.'
Beami's mind drifted back through time. 'One night I went up to the bar just as they were closing, spoke his name when I shouldn't have known it, gave him the wildest smile – then tripped, spilt my drink all over the floor, and started laughing.'
'Smooth,' Zizi remarked.
'He used to clear tables and serve drinks at what was once considered the smartest bar in Villiren – although that's not saying much. It's not there now; it's long gone. All that's left is what's in my head – echoes of a younger life, of simpler times.'
'You're hardly that old. Just you wait until you get to my age. Then things can be as simple as you want them to be. So, you went to his bar?'
'Well, I went in from time to time with a few of the girls, an ambitious young cultist with a taste for bad wine.'
'Some things don't change,' Zizi smiled.
'No, I guess not. I suspected he had developed feelings for me, you know, aside from the usual lingering glances, holding mine for as long as possible. I would then chat to some other man who approached me, sometimes looking at Lupus, sometimes not. Love feeds upon jealousy – that's what he himself told me once. Working in taverns, he said, you see that behaviour so much. Anyway, he picked me up off the floor, gave me a large mug of water and waited for me to sober up. He had such lovely eyes – just like a wolf.'
'Honey, that sounds wonderfully romantic. You got pissed and he mopped you up.'
'Shut up, Zizi! It was good, you know – it was fun. And we did nice stuff – lots of it. Before the Freeze, you could walk for miles out into the grassland, and the forests. We'd take a canvas tent and spend the summer evenings wrapped up in each other's arms. We'd go to the lakes further inland, away from everyone, and catch a fish, start a fire. I'd set traps for hares and sometimes I'd use his arrows to bring down a deer. I love this island, Y'iren. You can feel like you're the only people alive. We'd have sex four times a day.'
'Stop it. You're making me jealous now. I need some drink, and I don't care if it's too early.' Zizi stood up and ordered the young waiter to bring some whisky for her coffee. Once she had settled again, she waved a finger at Beami to get her to continue. 'This revelation is the closest I've got to love in a year.'
'Well, I was older than him by two years. He was so laid back, and I guess that's why we worked. I sometimes needed someone to boss around, and he couldn't be bothered ever to decide on matters. I wanted someone to air my frustrations to, and he liked to hear them.'
'What happened in the end?' Zizi asked. 'It all sounds too good to be true, yet the pair of you didn't last.'
'The army,' Beami explained. 'He wanted to be a Night Guard and I wanted to stay here, to work. It's so rare for any woman in the Empire to make something special of herself, and devoting my time to relics seemed a way around that for me. I didn't want to give that occupation up for anyone. We started to argue loudly, and we did those little things where people try to make each other jealous – when you try to make the other want you more. He promised he'd write often, great sprawling letters they were at first, and then they turned into simple updates. Pretty soon I never heard from him again.'
'Now that,' Rymble announced, suddenly wide awake and feeling gregarious, 'breaks my fucking heart. I'd scribble you a poem if you wouldn't wipe your arse on it.' He played with the gold ribbons dangling from his half- mask.
'Your poems are not even good enough for that basic function, you disgusting cretin,' Zizi declared, which made Beami laugh.
*
Like using a relic to carve a pathway back to your past.
This was it, the rarest of opportunities, a chance that most people didn't enjoy. Beami couldn't remember when she had last felt like this: the angst burning inside her, the worry about how she looked, whether her breath was fresh, wondering now if her new perfume was too strong, too obvious. Wondering if he would still think the same about her, after all these years. The mirror had become like some tool through which she began to deconstruct herself, noticing all the changes that age had brought. But she was still young. It wasn't as if an aeon had passed between them seeing each other.
In her best outfit, comprising of two layers of dark-red dress with a black shawl, a look that had lasted well in Villiren for a couple of years now, she waited. Waited for him.
Beami took a look around the furnishings of her room. Everything was expensive: decorative mahogany, not from this island, elaborate rugs and drapes, decorated in patterns from unheard-of tribes, ornaments that may or may not have had names, a crystal console table. Here was quality acting as an expression of her husband's wealth, yet she did not care for them at all. A deeper emotion had disabled the impact of these items on her life.
What am I thinking, asking him here?
The heating system spluttered again, firegrain stalling somewhere in the pipes. Snow skidded across the windows, distracting her attention, and she went to one, to regard the city beyond. The people of the city were still out and about, wrapped in furs, some selling biolumes, traders heading to the irens, carts and fiacres grinding to and fro along the main thoroughfares.
What if Malum returns unexpectedly…?
Malum was out, but this was still their marital home, and his property. Then again, why was she being so paranoid? It wasn't as if she was actually in the throes of an affair, was she, by just standing here in preparation for exploring the emotions of her past, feelings that she hadn't analysed for a number of years, also ones she had tried to forget. But she couldn't deny that it felt good, to allow this sense of nervousness to get the better of her. To feel such intensity again – to feel something again. It was like a game, and she felt she could almost burst with anticipation.
Was she being merely licentious? She hoped not.
A knock at the door.
She froze, then realized it would need to be answered by herself. She headed downstairs and with deep breaths opened the door to one of Malum's hired men.
''Scuse me, madam,' the thug grumbled, broad-shouldered and shaven-headed, wrapped in a thick cloak. 'Someone from the military to see you. Says he's from the Night Guard.'
'Yes, that's OK… I was expecting him. It's to do with my research on defence methods.' She should have known these men would be here first. What if they then told Malum? She didn't want to arouse his suspicions, so she had to act calmly.
'Fine.' The man gestured to one side.
Within moments, Lupus stood there, puzzlement evident on his face as he stepped around the thug's hulking figure. He was dressed in his Night Guard uniform, utterly black save for subtle patterns in the sewing and the gold star of the Empire on his breast. How he'd matured, she realized.
She let him in and closed the door. 'Please, come to the study area, and let's continue our business there.' Her voice was loud enough for the thug at the door to hear, and she could tell from Lupus's expression that he understood her need for secrecy.
'Lead on.' Lupus gestured eccentrically, playing along.
Beami's heart thumped as they headed down the corridor, entering the basement room in which she pursued her explorations of cultist technology.
She lit three lanterns, knowing their location by instinct rather than touch, but nearly knocked one over in her flustered excitement. To a stranger this workroom must look like a junkyard, a litter of curious devices that would mean very little to the layman. But she had organized and investigated much of this over the years, made notes, tested, then tested some more, all the time wondering if she might thus unlock some device the elder races had set, and if, as a result, this was how she might die.
She moved her Brotna relic – a great lumbering metal cone with wires sprouting from the top end – to one side.
'What's that?' he asked.
'A project I'm working on for the masons and architects,' she explained, wondering why they were wasting
