Bird of Chaos: Book One of the Harpy's Curse (31 page)

I often wonder what it might be like to have no expectation of grandeur, to be like Harryet: innocent and unassuming, a humble mollusc with a strong outer shell and soft inner flesh. To be so pure of heart; to be unsullied by the need for knowledge.
This
would be an accomplishment. “Yes, but
you
could be the master. You would be free to give orders and summon any companion of your choice.”

“But I couldn’t return? I could not undo this decision?”

“Not until I have killed my mother. I will send for you when it safe to return but Harry, I want you to have the life you deserve and I don’t think it is possible here.”

“Whether you go or not, your association with Verne will make you guilty,” Drayk says.

Harryet thinks for a long time. By now her thin gown is damp and stars of condensation have formed in her long wavy hair. “I won’t know what to do without you.”

“Nor I you.”

A silence stretches out between us and for a moment I think she or I, or both of us, might cry. “I will let you think on it but please make your decision by the morning,” I say, standing. Drayk stands and his presence beside me is a comfort.

“No,” she says, shaking her head. “Though it breaks my heart I will do it. Loyalty is loyalty. Gnosis guide me, I will go. I have always wanted to see the mainland.” She laughs humourlessly, fighting back tears. “I have heard that Caspius has the most beautiful seaside villages,” she says as we head for the door.

“People are kind there, especially to foreigners, and land is cheap. They will sell it to freeman or slave, as long as he has the gold,” Drayk says.

“I have no doubt,” she says, gradually convincing herself. After all it is her belief that, like the gods, there is good in everything I do.

“Caspius will be a place of great opportunity,” I say, wanting to believe it as much as she does. And yet it feels false to speak of a place I have never visited. For all I know Caspius is a vile cesspit of cutthroats and criminals. Still, I
will
ensure she has the gold she needs. This is something, is it not? Not enough, though, to temper the foreboding seeping through my skin.

Harryet—beautiful and consistent Harryet—looks at me with teary eyes. “I will do whatever I can to help. It has been an honour serving you.”

“Thank you.” My voice catches. “You have been a true friend.”

But have
I
been a true friend?
I wonder as we leave the bathhouse. I ignore this question and others like it. It is easy to ignore your conscience when your intentions are good.

Harryet is asleep. From my spot in her doorway I can see the gentle rise and fall of her body. She does not stir. I turn away and join Drayk in my solar. With guilt as my silent companion, I take his hand and lead him out of the apartment. “We will be back in a moment,” I say to Bolt as we pass. I ignore Nike and Adamon who stand at the bottom of the stairs. They, in turn, ignore us.

Neither Drayk nor I speak as we proceed along the Walk. We climb to the top of the Throne Room and I stand for a moment beside the bonsai garden, listening to the fountain. I cannot see the koi swimming beneath the water’s black surface but it is reassuring to know they are there. “I used to come here a lot with my father. While we waited for my mother.” I turn to the immortal. “But then she was suddenly so busy, you know? The pressure of running the nation got the better of her. And my father and I were spending so much time together. She was jealous…” I trail off, unwilling to remember my mother as she once was.

“A lot has changed since then.”

We hear footsteps on the stairs. I reach for his hand and pull him into a dark crevice between two buildings. Two hoplites reach the top of the stairs, look around, see nothing and descend.

“Verne, this is destroying me,” Drayk says. “I need…I want—”

I silence him by standing on tiptoe to kiss him. I can smell the warmth of him, the desire. He puts his arms around my waist and passionately consumes me, his complaint forgotten.

Every part of me is screaming out for him to touch me, to let me
be
him. I want to crawl inside him, for our bodies to merge and become one. He pushes me against the cold marble wall of the Chamber of Petitions and pins me there, my shoulder blades and skull against solid reality, the rest of me rising out of my body to hover above us and watch. As he explores my face with his lips, I imagine him pushing right through me, sinking into me. My senses call out to him:
Let me in, let me in.

He pulls away. “God, Verne. What are we doing?”

I say nothing but smile and try to imagine what it is like for him. He is a gift in himself, somewhat of a miracle. He is the water and the seed, giving and receiving life, regenerating over and over again without the need for a daughter to project him into the future. And yet he is just a man. His vision is limited. He can work with probability and deduce the likelihood of certain outcomes but he must still account for human inconsistency.

I hold his head between my hands and look deep into his eyes, trying to read him. To have a conversation with his atrama, to be given insight into his internal workings, his very being—now that would be magic. What would I learn of the indentured soldier, my sage? I would learn that he is an old man, so young, so wise and yet so naïve.

Drayk pulls away. His face is creased. “Verne, I must tell you something.”

I wait for him to continue.

He starts reluctantly, glancing at me the way my father glances at my mother, hoping for my approval, anticipating my wrath. “I want you to know, when I was a young man, before your mother let me join her personal guard…things were different. I was not the man I am today. Your mother led me to believe that I needed her, that I was indebted to her for my food, my shelter, my education.”

“She has that power over most of us.”

“Your mother manipulated me.”

I want to probe him further, to demand clarity, but I accept this morsel of information and cherish it, believing that in time he will give me more. He takes my hand and I am surprised by the strength of his grip.

“I want you to know that I would never hurt or betray you—never. I wanted to leave Tibuta but on my twentieth Name Day I realised who I was and I knew I was in a unique position to influence your mother, to help her tap the knowledge of the ages, my accumulated knowledge, to bring peace to Longfield, to stop the Tempest. Even then I had my doubts she would listen to me. I could have left. But you were born and as you grew I saw more potential in you than in any other monarch I had come across in all my thousand years.”

I listen attentively, holding my tongue when I want to interrupt because to do so would break the spell.

Drayk paces in front of me. “Before I came to Tibuta I longed to find others who were like me. For some hundred years I dedicated myself to tracking them down. One was corrupt. He used his immortality to accumulate riches, which he hid in a vast network of tunnels beneath a mountain. Another became an Ooruk monk and worshipped atop Mount Atha, waiting for the gate to open. I joined him for a time but became impatient when, after many lives, the gate remained shut.” He laughs bitterly, stroking his short beard. “I realised it was better to commit my life to humanity than live in false hope on a mountain.” He stops to look at me and I feel I could break under the intensity of his gaze. “Of course I wanted the gates to the Elysian Fields to open like everyone else, this is the only path to my freedom, but I realised there were other ways to wait, different stories to follow…” He takes my hand. “Verne, none of the immortals I came across in my travels were as passionate as you. They were distracted by greed and envy. None could see the value in committing their lives to a higher purpose, to pursuing something bigger than themselves, to putting their own happiness aside in the pursuit of something so magnificent, so awe-inspiring it could change the very course of history. You refuse to sit atop a mountain waiting. This is what sets you apart. You see what must be done and you do it. This is why I love you.”

I whisper, “I love you too.” Energy pulses between us. I am frightened by the earnest expression on his face.

“When you were young I promised to stay with you because I saw your potential. More than anything I want to be able to stay with you now. You know I have dedicated my life to serving Tibuta and House Golding. I have only a few more years to give before I am reborn elsewhere. I want to give them to you, Verne, before it is too late.”

He brings his hands to the back of his neck. “I have wanted to give you this for some time.” He holds out his amulet. “I love you. And what pain it causes me, what blissful release, after so many years, so many lives!” He pauses. “I love you, Verne. Not your body, though it is magnificent, not your beauty, but your mind. I love you for your wisdom, for what you have already done and for what you are going to achieve. I want to give myself to you.”

I am speechless. My body is alert, fearing danger, a trap, but also coursing with hot energy that pounds in my heart. He holds out a hand lined with the passage of time, each wrinkle a testament to his experience, each callus proof of his hard work. In the centre of his palm is a red stone no bigger than a pea. It swirls with his life force, red and grey storm clouds entrapped in a tiny bead. The gem is secured in a silver gallery on a leather thong.

“Your serpent stone?”

“I offer it to you as a symbol of my loyalty. Take it and know that whatever happens I love you.” I reach out and run my finger over the stone. It is hot to touch and pulses as if alive. “If anything happens, I will be reborn beside you. Nothing can come between us.”

I experience a sinking despair, as if the door of a cage has clanged shut. Yet Drayk’s youthful joy is contagious and I grin through moist eyes. He secures the stone around my neck with trembling hands.

Before I can change my mind I stand on tiptoe and place my lips against his. I run my fingers down his right ear to squeeze his earlobe in a gesture Tibuta women use to claim a man.

“You will not regret this. Trust me,” he says, kissing me.

I have heard that on the mainland a woman is expected to wait. She is expected to feign chastity and deny herself pleasure for the sake of…I am not entirely sure what. A man’s pleasure, perhaps? To maintain a contradiction? This is not the case in Tibuta. Rather, our society holds that a woman is entitled to just about whatever she pleases, that her delight only intensifies that felt by her companion. So why wait?

I skip across the mosaic tiles once the door to my suite is closed behind us. Drayk takes my hand and pulls me to him. We laugh. I run. He chases. We fumble. He sits on the edge of the bed and removes his sandals, slowly unlacing the leather thong and unwrapping it from around his firm calves. I watch him the way one might watch a foreign creature in a zoo then laugh and remove my own shoes, kicking them across the room.

We lie facing each other, knees and noses touching. “I could stare at you forever,” I whisper, losing myself in his grey eyes. He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. Our lips meet.

“Six years,” he says, rolling on top of me.

I groan in despair. “It’s not enough.”

Pinned beneath his weight, I hold my hand against his chest, partly to keep him at bay, partly to feel the strength of him against me. Admiring his crumpled uniform, I am aware of everything, alert like a hunting owl: my face in the straw of his hair, his tongue in the indentation of my throat. The taste of his finger in my mouth as he guides his tongue inside me. He takes hold of each of my fingers and sucks, his teasing eyes trained on my face.

I pull his shirt over his head and I trace the bronzed and freckled scar over his heart. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, looking deep into his eyes. “No one should ever be allowed to hurt you.”

He runs the tip of his finger along the neckline of my dress and between my breasts, sending ripples down my spine. “I’m not hurt.”

Drayk pushes my sleeves down and kisses the tops of my shoulders, his breath hot against my skin. He pulls the peplos to my waist revealing my tiny breasts. “Heritia you are beautiful,” he says and I am emboldened. I pull his head to my chest. His kisses are firm, making me groan. He works down my body with a skill afforded him by hundreds of year’s practice.

When he reaches my bellybutton I shudder in anticipation. I undo his belt buckle and help him out of his pants. His head disappears between my legs and makes a tent of my peplos. The distant ceiling is a blur.

A lark begins its melancholic morning song and Drayk reappears. “Is that the morning already?”

I laugh, take his head between my hands and pull him up to lick his face. My desire is living and breathing. It must be fed. I arch into him, gripping the side of the bed, my knuckles turning white.

He enters me slowly, gently, and holds me close until the pain is replaced with brilliant pleasure.

With eyes shut, I search for the gods and I find them hovering above the bed. We reach out to one another—the gods and me—our fingertips almost touching. I grope for them, pleading with them to let me touch them.
Please.
I feel exultant joy as I come closer and closer. Then it happens. The gods take my hand and pull me forward, out of the bed and into the air. A violent ecstasy shakes my entire being. Then they release me and I am with Drayk again, disorientated, grinning like a fool.