Tales of Old Earth (33 page)

“You don't know who I am, do you?” my dancing partner said.

“Of course I do,” I lied.

“Who, then?” She released me and stood back, hands on hips.

Challenged, I actually
looked
at her for the first time. She moved loosely within her blouse, a plump woman with big brown freckles on her face and forearms. She crossed her arms in a way that caused her breasts to balloon upward, and laughed when I flushed in embarrassment.

Her laughter struck me like the clapper of a great bell.

“Becky!” I cried. “By the Seven, it's you! I never expected—”

“You never expected I'd grow so fat, eh?”

“No, no!” I protested. “It's not—”

“You're a fool, Will Taverner. But that's not totally unbecoming in a man.” She drew me into the shadow of the stairway where there was privacy, and a small bench as well. We talked for a long time. And at the end of that conversation I thought she looked dissatisfied. Nor could I account for it until she reached between my legs to feel what was there. My cod, though, was a wiser man than I and stood up to greet her. “Well,” she said, “that's a beginning. Cold dishes aren't brought back to a boil in a minute.”

She left me.

You look unhappy. Becky's your mam, isn't she? Now that I come to think of it, there's that glint in your eye and a hint at that same diabolus that hides at the edge of her mouth. Well she's a widow now, which means she can do as she pleases. But I will horrify you with no more details of what we said.

Where's my pipe? What happened to that pouch of weed? Thank you. I'd be long asleep by now if not for its aid. This is the last trace of the
margakasaya
left in all the world. With me will die even the memory of it, for there are no elves abroad in the realms of men anymore. They have found
parikasaya
, “final extinction” you would say, or perhaps “the end of all.” Did you know that
am'rta skandayaksa
means “deathless elf-group?” There's irony there, knew we only how to decipher it.

Maybe I was wrong to kill the dragon.

Maybe he was all that kept them from oblivion.

When we had all shared Cakaravartin's vision of Great Asura and of the giants at labor, their faces stolid and accepting of both their guilt and their punishment, and spoken with Boramohanagarahant, their king, it was almost dawn. Cakaravartin passed around the pipe one more time. “I see that you are determined to come with us,” he said to me, “and that is your decision to make. But first you should know the consequences.”

Ratanavivicta's mask tilted in a way that I would later learn indicated displeasure. But Cakaravartin drew in deeply and passed the pipe around again. I was trembling when it came to me. The mouthpiece was slick with elf-spit. I put it between my lips.

I inhaled.

At first I thought nothing had happened. The common room was exactly as before, the fire dying low in the hearth, the elkmaid slowly quartering out the air as ever she had done. Then I looked around me. The elves were gone. I was alone, save for one slim youth of about my own age, whom I did not recognize.

That youth was you.

Do I frighten you? I frighten myself far more, for I have reached that moment when I see all with doubled sight and apprehend with divided heart. Pray such possession never seizes you. This—now—is what I was shown all these many years ago, and this is the only chance I will ever have to voice my anger and regret to that younger self, who I know will not listen. How could he? A raggedy taverner's boy with small prospects and a head stuffed full of half-shaped ambitions. What could I say to make him understand how much he is giving up?

By rights you should have been my child. There's the bitter nub of the thing, that Becky, who had all but pledged her heart to me, had her get by someone else. A good man, perhaps—they say half the Bridge turned out to launch his fire-boat when he was taken by the dropsy—but not me.

I have lost more than years. I have lost the life I was meant to have, children on my knee and a goodwife growing old and fat with me as we sank into our dotage. Someone to carry my memory a few paces beyond the emptiness of the grave, and grandchildren to see sights I will not. These were my birthright, and I have them not. In his callowness and ignorance, my younger self has undone me.

I can see him, even now, running madly after the elves, as he will in the shadowy hour before dawn. Heart pounding with fear that he will not catch up, lungs agonized with effort. Furious to be a hero, to see strange lands, to know the love of a lady of the
am'rta skandayaksa
. They are fickle and cruel, are the elves. Ratanavivicta snatched me from my life on a whim, as casually as she might pick up a bright pebble from the roadside. She cast me aside as easily as she would a gemstone of which she had wearied. There is no faith in her kind.

Ah, it is a dreadful night! The winds prowl the rooftops like cats, bringing in the winter. There'll be frost by morning, and no mistake.

Is the story over, you ask? Have you not been listening? There is no story. Or else it all—your life and mine and Krodasparasa's alike—is one story and that story always ending and never coming to a conclusion. But my telling ends now, with my younger self starting from his dream of age and defeat and finding himself abandoned, the sole mortal awake on all the Bridge, with the last of the elf horde gone into the sleeping streets of the city beyond the Dragon Gate.

He will leap to his feet and snatch up his father's sword from its place over the hearth—there, where my spear hangs now. He will grab a blanket for a cloak and a handful of jerked meat to eat along the road, and nothing more, so great will be his dread of being left behind.

I would not stop him if I could. Run, lad, run! What do you care what becomes of me? Twenty years of glory lie at your feet. The dream is already fading from your head.

You feel the breeze from the river as you burst out the door.

Your heart
sings
.

The moment is past. I have been left behind.

Only now can I admit this. Through all this telling, I have been haunted by a ghost and the name of that ghost was Hope. So long as I had not passed beyond that ancient vision, there was yet the chance that I was not my older self at all, but he who was destined to shake off his doubts and leap out that door. In the innermost reaches of my head, I was still young. The dragon was not slain, the road untraveled, the elves alive, the adventures ahead, the magic not yet passed out of the world.

And now, well. I'm home.

17

Midnight Express

Excuse me. This can't be right.

Yes?

According to this schedule, we arrive at Elf Hill Station at 8:23
PM
and after a half-hour layover, the train departs exactly two hundred years later.

Quite right.

But that can't be!

Is this your first time on this route?

Yes, my company is expanding into new markets. I'm a commercial traveler. I used to cover Indiana and Illinois.

Well, that explains it. I take it this is your first visit to Faerie? No previous travel experience in the Noncontiguous Territories—Grammarie, Brocielande, Arcadia, et cetera?

Well … no, but I've done a lot of traveling, and I've got an excellent record. I won the Daniel L. Houseman Sales Cup three years running.

Most impressive. An obviously intelligent man such as yourself, then, should have no trouble comprehending the chronologically liberated nature of the
night lands
, as we like to call them.

I beg your pardon. Chronologically liberated?

That's what I said. You'll have noticed that physical travel here is particularly dreamlike, that an hour can be spent rushing furiously past a small pond, that a hundred miles can go by in the wink of an eye. That's because you journey not only physically but temporally—back, forth, sideways in time. Much of the governance of the Territories is managed in that way. Which is a good thing, given how fey most of the officials of Oberon's court are. I doubt they could deal with matters in a more straightforward manner.

Phew! You'll pardon me for feeling dizzied. Things don't work that way where I come from.

That's not entirely true. There are owls.

Owls?

Owls are continuously flying back and forth through time. It's their nature. That's why they have that short labyrinthine name: the circle, the recomplication, the straight line. It's also why they're nocturnal. Ambichronology is so much easier when nobody's looking.

Then that's why it's still night, even though we've been traveling so long?

I said that you were intelligent! To differing degrees, it's always night here. Don't worry about Elf Hill. You'll make up the time later. Or earlier—fourth-dimensional grammar is so boring, don't you think? I trust you have a Baedeker. You'll want to study it carefully.

I see I will. Well. That clears things up quite a bit. Thank you.

You're welcome. Do you like my breasts?

I—yes, they're quite lovely.

You may touch them if you wish. Yes, like that. Mmmmm. Both hands, please.

They're amazingly soft and … warm, aren't they?

It's the fur. You haven't said anything about my nipples.

They're beautiful too. And pink. Startlingly so.

All my leathers are pink. Look at the pads of my paws. Exactly the same.

Wow! Those are some claws.

Three inches long. Needle sharp. Retractable. They can slice through steel. They can gut a man from crotch to sternum in less time than it takes to say it. You took your hands away.

I wouldn't want to get, ah, overly familiar with you.

I'll let you know if you're getting fresh. You're not entirely unattractive, you know. For a mortal.

Really, I'm nothing much. Just a commercial traveler. Nobody special.

I feel myself strangely drawn to you.

I can't imagine why.

A woman—well, a female, at least—has certain needs. Desires. No, needs.

I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about.

You have noticed that I'm female, haven't you? And beautiful. God's own lioness, a poet called me once. Isn't that lovely? It's a pity what happened to him.

I think I'd better leave.

I think you'd better not. I think you'd be well advised to stay. In fact, I don't believe you'd be able to leave if you wanted to. If you get my meaning.

I—I'm afraid I do.

Good. You should take off your suit.

Yes. Perhaps I should.

I'll lock the door. So we're not disturbed.

Who—what—would dare disturb
you?

You'd be surprised. Slowly, little mouthful, slowly! Don't just throw off those clothes. We've got all the time we need; night lasts forever here, remember. Oh, now that's quite nice. You must work out every day. Now the trousers. My! You're a big one. I hope that's not painful to you. I promise to take good care of it. Afterwards I'll ask you a riddle.

Why?

It's just my nature, I'm afraid. I'd spare you if I could. But let's not think about that now. What would you like to do first?

I'm not sure I should.

I beg your pardon.

It's just that it … well, it would be bestiality. Wouldn't it?

It's only bestiality if
I
am a beast. Do you think me a beast?

I … I don't know.

Good. That's the way it should be. It would be impertinent for you to presume one way or the other. Now let's see, how shall I begin? I think I'll just—mmmm. And then—ahhhh. You like that, don't you?

Well …

There's no need to be coy. Nobody's taking notes; this is completely off the record. Bring your mouth here. Kiss me. Yes. Now lower. Lower. There. Yes. The other one too. Oh, that's quite nice—what you do with your hands. Yes, I like that. Lower.

My God, you're so …

Yes, I'm a hairy bitch all right. Keep doing that. I'll just stretch around like this and …

Watch it with those claws!

Sorry. I'm passionate by nature—Mediterranean, you understand. Here, I'll lick away the blood. Now isn't that better?

Yes.

Oh, my! I feel quite carried away. I think I'd like to—

None of that, now!

Tsk. What's life without a little risk? Here. I'll just run my tongue up the side, and then … You liked that, eh? The way I closed my lips about the tip?

My God, yes.

Let's see how much of that monster I can take in my mouth at once.

That's … oh yes, that's fine, that's …
Whoah!

Did I hurt you?

No, I, I'm just startled is all. I wasn't expecting—

What use are such fine sharp teeth as mine if they're never used? I didn't actually break the skin anywhere, did I? No, I didn't think I had. It's not the sort of thing I'd do by accident. Come up here, you. Yes, bring your face to mine. Now we kiss. So you can taste yourself in my mouth and I can taste myself in yours. Let the flavors mingle. That's what's called the alchemical marriage. It can be harnessed to work magics.

Like what?

Well, I'll admit I've never actually done it myself. There was never anything I wanted at that particular moment more than what I could easily arrange for myself with materials on hand.

I could think of a few things.

Really? Then tell me, what would you like to have
right now?
Be honest. What is it you really want most? Diamonds? A gold Rolex? A mission-style hacienda with central air, in-ground heated pool, and a tennis court?

I'd … like your mouth again. You know. What you were doing before.

Oh, wise little monkey! And here's your reward for choosing so well.

Ahhh. This is wonderful. This is so good. I could do this all night.

Be careful what you wish for. Remember where we are.