Shit, I thought; what time is it? I glanced at the clock-six P.M.! And it’s Thursday! How could I have slept for two days? Oh, by god-Gio’s meeting! I’m late! I pulled myself out of bed, feeling weak and sick, viscid with self- recrimination and resentment. Shira, you stupid bastard; you really can’t leave it alone, you can’t control it. Ninety years in and out of scolopendium; you should have learned by now. I snarled, “You don’t fucking deserve to be an Eszai at all!”
Evening was now invisible through storm clouds clustered over the Castle. The rally starts in three hours; at full speed I might be able to make it in time. Torrential rain had seeped in through a broken shutter and my satchel was lying in a shallow pool. I couldn’t stand the thought of putting my hand in cold water, so I kicked it to a less saturated part of the floor.
I looked for any sign of Tern, but she had spent the day away. Catching myself shaking, I suddenly flooded with anger. Nothing rules me; what the fuck have I
Can’t waste the rest, anyhow, I vindicated. I stalked down to the lower room, where I diluted my last vial of cat and decanted the preparation into a little hip flask so I could take sips while traveling. A drift of letters had piled up against my door and when I opened it they fell into the room. I ignored them and pinned up a withered note that read, “I’m not in but you needed the exercise.” I spread my wings, wriggled through a slit window and jumped off bound for Eske.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
My wings skirred in the wet air. I flew fast, but the faint trace of Tern’s perfume on my clothes kept distracting me. I pulled the neck of my T-shirt over my nose and sniffed her rich and peppery scent. She smelled the same as she did the first time I saw her. I met Tern when, on a Messenger’s errand, Lightning gave me a missive to deliver to his neighbor, the Governor of Wrought. The letter was a blank piece of paper and Lightning is an accomplished matchmaker, but I didn’t discover that till decades later. I think that Lightning, being a connoisseur of exquisite things, appreciated Tern’s beauty and hoped that I would preserve it forever in the Circle. I sought an audience with Tern in her stateroom. She was untouchable, as self-contained as a cushion cat, small and dark-haired, infinitely more refined than a Rhydanne. Her white dress clung to her body all the way down to the floor. I adored her voice the instant she spoke; it was like being dipped in warm caramel. I wanted to offer her books to read aloud.
In the following year, 1892, Tern decided to marry. She put out word that she would welcome challengers for her hand and organized a series of formal balls and dinners for her suitors, who arrived in droves and began to decant gold into the vaults of Wrought. The competition was much tougher than I had imagined; they all had titles and most of them had manors. I had nothing to offer her except my kiss, which bestowed immortality, but I thought she could not possibly want someone like me.
I had lost my virginity with three girls together in Wellbelove’s
When I first visited Awia I was just as wild; I swept through the country like a swarm. In Peregrine and Tambrine I partied till four of the morning. I frequented the theater each night in Micawater and strayed from pavement cafes to bars, meeting artists and dollymops in the narrow streets of that pristine town. In Rachiswater I took advantage of the local girls and long walks by the lakeside. In Sheldrake I stayed, finding the sea air analeptic, and at Sarcelle’s palace they set fifteen tables of feast for us each night.
From there I rode the Black Coach to Tanager, and dropped meringue and absinthe on the patched bedspreads of the Corogon School Whorehouse. Enclosed by bowers and founded by schoolgirls, its roof garden was rampant if the weather was fine. It slouched across the adjoining roofs of a whole street, warmed by the hot, stale shops below. I fucked the girls and drank their homebrew while cries drifted out from the inmates in the lunatic asylum; the girls knew them all by name.
I never believed that love existed. I wanted to smash it all up into shards and cut myself with the sharpest. But Shira Dellin changed me. Then came Tern, who transformed me a little more. I loved her, the color of her skin, shapely legs and plumage; I wanted to fill my senses with her.
Tern’s unattainable demeanor was an aphrodisiac and a barrier. I didn’t want to join her noble class but I dreaded that her chocolate voice would laugh and reject me. Her suitors sensed my insecurity and uttered barbed comments to convince me; she wouldn’t want to marry a freak. When I met Shira Dellin I had been surprised to discover that I found Rhydanne girls captivating, but she had turned me down spectacularly. I flew to see Lightning, who instantly understood the cause of my haggard, insomniac appearance. I desperately begged him for advice. After all, he was the expert and I was so bewildered I was prepared to follow any instruction. He suggested, “Lady Wrought would love to receive gifts.”
I gave her a live kestrel that I caught in the air, its wings bound to its body with embroidery thread. “Comet,” she said, “what am I going to do with this?”
Next day I stole in, offering her edelweiss from a mountain that no one can climb. “Get out!” she said. “I’ll only see you at dinner with the rest of the suitors!” I backed off, stepped up to the velvet window seat and, horrendously, found that my boots were still filthy from the stables. She pointed sternly at the casement through which she had released the kestrel. “Your turn to fly away!”
In despair and fatigue, I started to use scolopendium. One night, because I was unaccustomed to it, I overdosed and discovered the Shift. I slowly had a palace built there, Sliverkey, in order to give me confidence to court Tern, but in my homeland I owned nothing, no lineage, barely a pot to piss in.
“No, no!” Lightning admonished, amused. “She’s not a hungry Rhydanne. It’s important to give her beautiful presents, ones that will last, to remind her of you when you’re absent. You must make her feel wanted and special-I suppose you could always offer her stories. Ladies love tales and you seem to have an inexhaustible supply.”
I flew from the Castle to see Tern when my duties were done. I perched by the bedroom window and told her stories. She was very eager to know about the Castle; she urged me to tell the things I took for granted-what’s behind the Throne Room screen? What does the Emperor look like? How does one talk with him? Few of my exploits genuinely held Tern’s wandering attention, but she liked me to describe a ruined ancient Awian citadel far north in the Paperlands.
The unreachable chateau had interested me since the first time I saw it, from the sickle summit of Bhachnadich. The Paperlands surrounded northern Darkling like an ocean, an unbroken surface of gray Insect constructions that lapped into points and fell away into shallow valleys. In perfect conditions, a ruin was seen on the horizon, rising through the paper crust. It appeared to be a massive square edifice topped by a stone dome. Sunlight flickered on its peeling leaves of gilt as they fluttered in the wind.
Tern’s interest spurred me to the idea that if I dared travel to the ruins I might touch down on the dome and return alive. I trialed a distance flight without landing once, I then climbed Bhachnadich and launched myself from its thousand-meter rock face. I picked up the katabatic Ressond gale and sped over the Insects’ territory.
A long lion-gold winter light lay across the Paperlands. Far below among the rigid cells I saw Insects scurrying, going about their instinctive lives. If I crashed, thousands would dart out of their tunnels and tear me apart. If I don’t crash, Tern will love this story.
I glided to rest and then flew on. After hours of alternately gliding and flapping I became exhausted. Burning and stiffening in my wings and back distracted me from Tern and punished me for being so stupid as to fall in love. When it became too much to bear I took tiny sips of the wonderful panacea painkiller I had bought; the agony melted away.
As evening advanced the Ressond wind declined in strength. I shed all unnecessary weight in midair; unlaced and dropped my boots and bits of clothing until I was just wearing a shirt and shorts. After sunset I flew by a
