orgiasts. Their evangelical mania, however, was a minor vice when held up to the commendable Christian charity with which they shared their bodies with whomever desired them. Surplus looked forward to the rest of the evening with glad anticipation, though he was certain that he would be wondrously sore come morning.
Then he saw the procession come flowing down the street.
A good quarter of the marchers held torches whose light bounced flickeringly off of waving red cloth banners, so that the procession appeared almost to be a river of fire. Then the sound of distant banging and blaring crossed the threshold of audibility, followed shortly after by the surf of human voices. As they came into focus, he saw that the marchers were waving their fists and chanting, and that many of them did not appear to be human at all.
“Huh,” he said wonderingly. “Will you look at this?”
Everyone gathered before the windows, a warm mass of naked bodies jostling together as comfortably as so many cattle in a barn. Hips bumped against hips, arms were placed about waists, and shoulders affectionately rubbed shoulders, without discrimination or preference for age, gender, or station. A strangely meaningful sense of community encompassed Surplus, a conviction that they were all of one flesh and shared a common self. The edges of the window panes glinted prismatically.
This was, the rational part of his mind argued, merely a contagious intoxication resulting from his inhalation of air tainted by the sweat or breath or other exudations of his drugged comrades. Nevertheless, he felt a genuine and abiding love for them all, and for the whole world as well. It hardly mattered whence it came.
Outside, the procession drew nearer. Surplus felt his eyes grow wide with wonder. In among the torch- carriers and banner-wavers were beggars and aristocrats, soldiers in uniform and unbloused bohemians, a white- clad giant or two, and great numbers of what looked to be some kind of chimeric bird-demons as well. As he watched, one of the banners suddenly disintegrated in a puff of red dust. Yet those carrying the staffs continued waving them from side to side, as if the banner were still there. Meanwhile, horn-blowers who could not play and drummers with no sense of rhythm filled the air with cacophonous noise.
It was a parade that would have dumbfounded Hieronymus Bosch. And, inexplicably, gazing down upon it, Surplus felt an internal tugging, a desire to add his small spirit to their turbulent river of souls. The sheer press of numbers called to him, much as a pebble streaking through space is drawn to a planet. He wanted to pour himself into their molten river of souls, to be melted down, lost, and mingled into their collective identity.
Windows slammed up and doors were flung open in the buildings that the procession passed by. People of all kinds poured out to join the march.
“He has come,” Baronessa Avdotya murmured. Her eyes glowed fanatically.
“Eh?” Surplus said. “Who has?”
“It does not matter. All that matters is that he is here at last.”
To Surplus’s bafflement, the others made noises of agreement, as if her cryptic statement had been a model of sense and logic. The baronessa pointed over the rooftops to a growing brightness arising in the distance, entirely distinct from the procession flowing by outside. “That is where he is now,” she said with inexplicable certainty. “In Pushkin Square.”
“We must join him,” Irina said.
“Yes,” agreed the mustachioed gent who, minutes before, had been admiring her bottom. “As soon as possible. No, sooner! We must go out into the street now, this minute. Where are my clothes? Somebody summon the serviles to find our clothes.”
“I do not see that clothes are necessary,” the baronessa said. “Irina and I shall go forth to meet him in the same innocent flesh that God gave us and not one stitch more.”
The group was breaking up now, and Surplus could breathe more easily. He shook his head to clear it and then ran to place himself between the two ladies and the door.
“Wait, wait, my sweet loves. There is a fine distinction between delightful spontaneity and foolhardiness, and the two of you are about to cross over from one to the other.”
“Do not try to stop us. I never go back on a decision.”
“That’s true,” Irina said. “I’ve known her for ever so long, and it’s true.”
“Have you both gone mad?” Surplus cried. “Dear ladies, you simply cannot traipse out into Ilyinka ulitsa stark naked.”
Avdotya’s eyes flashed. “And why not? Are we not pleasing before the eye of God? Is there anything shameful or inadequate about our bodies?”
“Quite the contrary. But surely questions of temperature alone…”
“Our virtue will keep us warm.”
“But, baronessa,” Surplus said desperately, “if you are naked, how is anybody to know you are of noble birth?”
Baronessa Lukoil-Gazproma stopped. “That is true.” She snapped her fingers to get the nearest servile’s attention. “Dress me,” she said, “in the green silk with crimson pearls.”
“And I,” Irina said, “in my self-cloned leathers.”
The servile went into the wardrobe and emerged first with a dress that flowed like water, and then with an outfit the exact same creamy color as Irina’s own skin. Emotionlessly he proceeded to dress the two ladies.
Surplus, who had no intention of leaving the safety and anonymity of the baronessa’s apartment before morning, picked out a midnight-blue dressing gown brocaded with gold-and-red firebirds and trimmed with lace at the cuffs and lapel. A garment of such masculine cut must ordinarily be reserved, he presumed, for the baronessa’s husband. However, that distinguished gentleman being so open-minded as to share his wife’s tenderest caresses, at least in absentia, Surplus did not doubt he would be equally generous with his wardrobe. So he threw it on and cinched the sash.
Already the first of the guests was leaving, greatcoat draped over his arm, hopping on one foot as he donned a shoe. By the time Irina and Avdotya were fully dressed, most of their friends had disappeared out the door.
Surplus wandered back to the window. The procession was only a block away, and it filled the street. It seemed impossible there could be so many people in all of Moscow. Yet there they were, and their numbers were growing. He could see women running out of the buildings barefoot and men with their trousers in their hands. Nor was it only orgiasts who joined in. Caught up by the excitement, parents and nannies abandoned their homes, leaving children staring in bafflement from windows and open doors. It was as if all the world were made of up changelings, who were only just now revealing the goblins hidden beneath the skin.
Directly below, among the departing hedonists, Surplus saw one of the baronessa’s serviles throwing a scarf over her head. She threw a shrewd glance over her shoulder such as no servile was capable of. Perhaps she saw Surplus in the window; but she did not see him seeing her, that he was certain. She could not possibly see his eyes at such a distance in so dim a light, and he was careful to hold his head in a way that suggested he was not looking her way.
Slowly, carefully, Surplus turned to one side, yawned, and scratched himself in a manner that no gentleman would have done in the presence of a woman. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the servile turn her back with a disgusted flip of her head and hurry away. She did not go with the others, but in the opposite direction, toward Chortenko’s manor.
So, Surplus thought, the baronessa’s household had a spy. Well, on reflection, it was only to be expected. Still, he dared stay here no longer.
The obvious remaining option was to join the mob.
At the doorway, the baronessa had just bid a gracious farewell to the last of her guests. “Ahhh, Surplus,” she said, with a touch of sadness that suggested she already knew how he would answer. “Won’t you please join us?”
“You had but to ask, bellissima. While I’m dressing, I’ll have the carriage brought around to the door.”
Thus it was that Sir Blackthorpe Ravenscairn de Plus Precieux, ambassador of Byzantium, native-born American, and loyal citizen of the Demesne of Western Vermont, joined the revolution.
The taverns and brothels of Zamoskvorechye were hopping. There were bonfires in the street and music in the air. “That one,” General Magdalena Zvyozdny-Gorodoka said, pointing to the busiest house of ill repute. Throwing her reins to one of the soldiers they had conscripted along the way, she pushed through the door. Zoesophia followed, while the baron stayed outside to deploy their meager forces.
The brothel keeper, confronted suddenly by the stocky general with the famous red curls, rubbed both hands together and groveled. “Such an honor!” she cried. “Any of our girls are yours, General, as many as you wish! With
