The Sheri S. Tepper eBook Collection

  His intensity made her uncomfortable. ‘Isn’t it all more or less harmless?’ she said, trying to minimize the whole matter. ‘Mere superstition? Regrettable, but not … not…’

  ‘Not dangerous? When the ritual demands blood, or maiming, or death, or binding forever?’ His voice had become austere, his expression forbidding and remote. ‘The difference between a true religion – and there are many which share aspects of truth – and a dangerous cult is only this: In the one the individual is freed to grow and live and learn; in the other the individual is subordinated to the will of a hierarchy, enslaved to the purposes of that hierarchy, forbidden to learn except what the cult would teach. You have only to look at the rules which govern the servants of a religion to know whether its god is God indeed, or devil!’ He passed his hand across his face, then laughed unsteadily. ‘Listen how I preach. Aghrehond should not have told you to question me about this. My anxiety is too close to my skin. Come, we will ride up to the others and think no more of it.’

  But when they rode into the gravel courtyard near the stables, Marianne thought of it again, for a long black car stood there, the black and red diplomatic flag of Lubovosk fluttering over its hood.

  ‘I had not expected her for several hours yet,’ said Makr Avehl. Then, as he sat there, looking at the flag, he was struck with a comprehension so violent that he swayed in the saddle. Tabiti. Madame Delubovoska. Harvey’s aunt, his kinswoman. Why had he not made this simple connection before? If Harvey had not had the wit to pick out the things he had given to Marianne, if someone else had done so, someone sly, vile, deeply schooled in all the black arts – why, it would have been Tabiti.

  ‘Lord of Light,’ he thought, terrified. ‘Of course it would have been Tabiti, and I have brought Marianne here, like bringing a lamb into a cave of wolverines.’ They had been so casual with one another when he’d met them in New York, he hadn’t realized that they were not merely related, not merely acquaintances, but actually akin, sympathetic. He turned to Marianne with some urgency, knuckles white where they gripped the reins. ‘Wait,’ he warned himself. ‘Do not jump too quickly. You are not sure that this is true.’ But he was sure, so sure that his face was ten years older, drawn with concentration, when he turned to take Marianne’s hand.

  ‘Kinswoman, I will ask you in advance to forgive me if I pay you little attention for the next several hours. Now that I have learned a bit more about your half brother and his relationship to Lubovosk, I think it was a foolish mistake to invite him into my house, a foolish mistake to invite Tabiti here. The dimensions of my foolhardiness were unclear. I could not be more sorry. Will you forgive me?’

  She managed to create a smile, eager to give him whatever help she could. ‘I’ll pay no attention at all.’

  ‘Stay with Ellat,’ he counseled. ‘Stick to her like a leech.’

  ‘Ellat may get rather bored with that.’

  ‘Ellat will prefer it,’ he grated.

  They went into the house, to all appearances a cheerful, chattering group, through the open doors of the library where Ellat awaited them, her face slightly drawn with strain. As Marianne entered the room, she saw nothing but the two figures across it, Harvey and the Madame, faces alike as twins, eager with some strange avidity she could not identify, eyes hungry and glittering. They were staring only at Marianne, and she felt their eyes like a blow.

  Harvey came to take her by the hand, his own palm wet and sticky as though he had been working in the sun. ‘Well, little sister. Back from the ride? Come meet a relative of ours.’ She nodded, murmuring ‘of course’ as he drew her from Makr Avehl’s side across the room into a cold, threatening space where it was all she could do to smile between tight lips in acknowledgment of the introduction. Madame’s eyes were like those of a bird of prey; they seemed to whirl like wheels of fire, and her voice had serrated edges to it, a kind of velvet file rasping in her head.

  ‘I’m so pleased to get to meet you at last, my dear. My nephew has mentioned you so often, told me so much about you. How is the school going? Did I understand you had had some academic difficulties?’

  Marianne tried to deny this, tried to say that she had had no difficulty, except in carrying a heavy load of course work in addition to working full time, but the words stuck in her throat.

  She heard Harvey’s voice as though through a pool of thick water, thick, cold water, gelid, about to crystallize into ice making a thunder in her ears. ‘Oh, I don’t think Marianne lets that worry her. She isn’t that serious about her work.’

  Again Marianne tried to protest, realizing in panic that she could not breathe. She was suffocating. Then Ellat was beside her, saying something about Marianne’s having promised to look at the orchids in the conservatory, and she was drawn away from them and was in another room, leaning against a wall, gasping for breath.

  ‘What … how…’ she gasped. ‘What happened?’

  ‘It is an amusement for her,’ said Ellat angrily. ‘It’s something she does. For fun, I think. She tried it on me, but Makr Avehl had warned me. I will show you how to prevent its happening again. Also, I’ve had your things moved out of the guest wing and into my room. It’s a large room with two beds, and we will share it. I think it will be safer if you are not alone. We’ll go there now.’ And the two of them sneaked away upstairs like naughty children, though Ellat continued her angry muttering the while. Once behind the closed door, Ellat washed Marianne’s face with a cool washcloth, as though she had, indeed, been a child.

  ‘It’s frightening, isn’t it? I could see your face turning red, as though you couldn’t get your breath.’

  ‘What did you mean, it’s something she does? I don’t understand what’s going on.’

  ‘Have you ever heard of telepathy?’

  ‘I’ve heard of it. I don’t believe in it.’

  ‘Well, then don’t believe in it if you don’t want to, Marianne, but listen to me anyhow. That woman down there, that – Lubovoskan,’ she spat the word as though it had been a curse. ‘That woman made a very strong telepathic suggestion to you that you could not breathe, that you were suffocating. As I said, she tried it on me earlier, but Makr Avehl had warned me. Now, if you aren’t comfortable with the idea of telepathy, that’s fine. Call it subliminal suggestion or something. Or pretend she has a transmitter in her pocket that blocks your brain waves. Whatever. She can do it, and you felt it.’

  ‘I don’t believe this,’ Marianne protested. Things like this aren’t possible.’

  ‘Well,’ said Ellat, ‘you felt it. Was it false? A result of riding too long, perhaps? Coming into a warm room out of the air? Dizziness? Perhaps something to do with the menstrual cycle – that’s always a good explanation for such things. Hysteria?’ She waited angrily for Marianne’s denial, which did not come. ‘No. It was none of these things. It was an unworthy exercise of certain abilities which should never be used in such a way. It is a kind of seduction, one of several kinds they use. Well, we knew she could do such things. We did not know she would do them; particularly, we did not think of her doing them here or to you. So you must either run or confound her. Which is it to be?’

  ‘I will confound her,’ pledged Marianne, repulsed by the memory of Harvey’s hungry, prurient eyes. It had been Ellat’s use of the word “seduction” which had decided her. Of course it was a kind of seduction. A kind very like the one Harvey had been trying on her for years, a seduction of power, of oppression, of dominance. ‘I will confound her if I can, but she makes me feel like Harvey does. I can feel her peeling me, taking my skin off to look inside, layer by layer. I feel flayed when she looks at me. She scares me.’

  ‘That one scares Makr Avehl himself, girl. But I think we can manage to get through the evening.’ She began to clear the top of her dressing table, beckoning Marianne to a place before the mirror where she could see her own frightened face above Ellat’s busy hands.

  ‘This,’ said Ellat, making a specific shape with her left hand, ‘we call the “to
wer of iron.” Make this shape with your hand. No. Look at it more closely. That’s right. Now this we call the “wall which cannot be moved.” I will tell you about these…’ So the lesson began.

  Hours later Marianne sat before the mirror once more, dressed in one of the new outfits, a glittering silver sheath, hair piled high in a simple, dramatic style which one of Ellat’s maids had done for her. She breathed deeply, setting her own center of being high and balanced. ‘You will not get me again, Harvey,’ she said. ‘Not you or your aunt.’ The woman in the mirror could be afraid of nothing. I am a tower of iron, she sang quietly to herself in the litany Ellat had taught her, moving her hand in the proper sign. I am a fortress of strength, a wall which cannot be moved.

  Ellat was running a brush across her shining head, patting the full knot which she wore low upon her neck. ‘Remember to think reflection. Visualize lightning striking a mirror and being reflected back. Remember.’

  Marianne shut her eyes, fastened her sparkling necklace with its shining pendants. She glittered all over, a gemmy wand, bending and swaying, the necklace flashing. ‘I remember, Ellat. I’m trying to remember everything you’ve said.’

  ‘I’ll be right beside you. There’s the dinner gong. Shall we go down?’

  Marianne took a deep breath, nodded, began to breathe slowly, calmly, focusing her thought upon strength and will. They went into the library as though for a stroll in the gardens, setting themselves like adamant against the will of Madame, against the hot curiosity in Harvey’s avid eyes. Was it only her imagination, thought Marianne, or did he seem disappointed? What did that questioning look to Madame mean? Perhaps they had not expected her to be able to come down to dinner at all. She gritted mental teeth and smiled, visualizing lightning with every fiber in her brain. I am a tower of iron.

  Madame came toward her at once, Harvey trailing behind, making Marianne think irreverently of a mother goose with one gosling, Madame’s expression being very much a looking-down-the-beak one. She laid a hand on Marianne’s shoulder and Marianne stepped back, out of her reach. Madame’s eyes glittered at this and she said, ‘Harvey and I were just discussing what you might enjoy seeing when you come to Lubovosk with your brother.’

  I am a fire which cannot be put out, she thought. ‘Really?’ she said aloud. ‘I have not contemplated such a trip, and it’s unlikely I could travel so far any time soon.’

  ‘Oh, Bitsy, anything is possible,’ said Harvey, smiling, sipping at his cocktail, lips wet and avid in the soft light of the room, sucking lips, vampire lips.

  ‘Not for me, I’m afraid,’ she said, smiling in return. I am a tower of iron. ‘Besides,’ she turned a spiteful riposte, ‘if I traveled to that part of the world, it would be to my mother’s people – to Alphenlicht.’ Had she put that slight emphasis on my, my mother’s people? Yes. The air boiled around her and she felt Madame’s fury like a blow.

  ‘There is really very little there to interest you, my child,’ the woman said. ‘Very little of interest to anyone. It is a country of peasants and priests.’

  ‘Do I hear my name being taken in vain?’ asked Makr Avehl, offering Marianne a glass and taking her elbow in his hand to turn her away toward other guests. ‘What is this about peasants and priests? Are you talking shop again, Tabiti?’ Marianne felt his fingers tremble on her arm, knew that he was almost as sunk in rage as Marianne herself, felt herself adrift in these vicious currents which spun around her. I am a fortress of strength, she told herself, moving away to be introduced to other guests, Ellat close behind her.

  At dinner, she was at the far end of a long table from Harvey and Madame, and she was able to ignore them for moments at a time. After dinner, they came close to her again, the thrust of their intention as clear as though they had struck at her with a blade. Makr Avehl spoke to her only casually, as to any other guest. Ellat stayed close.

  I am a fortress of diamond, Marianne told herself, concentrating upon reflecting their intentions back upon themselves. She moved her hand into the configurations Ellat had shown her, then thought about them, internalized them. A mountain of stone. Making a hard fist with her right hand. I cannot be moved or changed. I am the fire which cannot be put out. Flicker of first and second finger of the right hand, a trill of movement, secretive.

  ‘Hey, Bitsy,’ Harvey called. ‘How are you getting back to town tomorrow?’

  I am diamond, Marianne told herself. ‘I hadn’t thought about it, Harvey.’ Quietly asserting the while, I am iron. Left forefinger raised, pressed against cheek.

  ‘Then you must let me drive you back.’ Madame, gaily importunate. ‘Your brother has already consented to accompany me, and your home is on our way.’

  ‘Marianne.’ Makr Avehl, laughing. ‘I am crushed! Had you forgotten so soon that you promised I could drive you back? I have those papers to pick up which your librarian so kindly offered to lend to me.’

  I am iron. I am adamant. Smiling, turning to him with a little moue of forgetfulness. ‘I did promise. Of course. I’m sorry, Madame. Another time, perhaps.’ I am the fire which cannot be put out.

  ‘Oh, I am disappointed. Yes, we will certainly make another occasion. I have not had opportunity to get to know you nearly as well as I should like.’ Gentle, caressing, infinitely threatening.

  We are like Siamese fighting fish, thought Marianne. We circle, our fins engorged with blood, ready to die if need be, caught up in our dance. She flinched nervously as Ellat touched her on the arm.

  ‘Would you like to go up? You said you wanted to ride early in the morning.’

  Taking this lead, Marianne nodded gratefully. ‘Thank you, Ellat. Yes. I am a little tired. The ride this afternoon was a longer one than I’ve had in years. Good night, Madame, Harvey. Madame Andami, I enjoyed your company today. Mr Williams, Betty. I enjoyed our discussion at dinner. Mrs Williams. Mr Winston-Forbes, Harriet, Stephany. Good night, Your Excellency. It has been a very pleasant day.’ To walk away, back straight, face calm, up the stairs. I am a tower of adamant, I cannot be moved. Down the hall with Ellat, into the room, to collapse across the bed, bent tight around a stomach which heaved and squirmed within her.

  ‘You did very well,’ said Ellat, giving her a glass of something sweet and powerful which melted warmth through her and stopped the heaving.

  ‘Nothing happened,’ Marianne whispered. ‘If you’d taken a movie of it, you wouldn’t have seen anything. Nothing happened at all. But I kept feeling them.’

  ‘Nothing seemed to happen; very much was happening. Your half brother has made an alliance. He has done it very suddenly it seems. Did he know her before?’

  ‘I never heard him mention her name until a day or so ago. I didn’t know he had relatives in Lubovosk.’

  ‘He writes mockingly of the Cave of Light. That is a typical Lubovoskan attitude.’

  ‘I only know what I told you earlier. I think he went there twice. Once shortly before Mama died. Once, later, before Papa Zahmani died. When each of them died, Harvey had … had…’

  ‘Had only recently returned?’

  ‘Had only recently returned,’ she agreed in a dead voice, remembering Dr Brown’s words, heard through a closed door when she had been only twelve: ‘I would have said she died of suffocation, Haurvatat.’ Suffocation. Not being able to breathe. A thing Madame did to people for fun. Had Madame been able to teach that skill to Harvey? Harvey, who had been rejected by Cloud-haired mama and told to go find a nice girl his own age? Or had Madame herself come to confront Cloud-haired mama when no one else was there to see, to remember?

  ‘There may be no connection at all,’ said Ellat firmly, undoing the tiny buttons at the back of Marianne’s gown. ‘Go in there and have a nice, hot shower and put on your robe. Makr Avehl will come up here before he goes to bed. After a good night’s sleep, nothing will look so ominous.’

  ‘I’m afraid I won’t sleep,’ she confessed, the vision of Mama and Madame in intimate confrontation still oppressing her.

  ‘
Another glass of what I gave you before, and you will sleep.’

  Makr Avehl’s light tap at the door came late, when the party downstairs had broken up and the sound of voices calling goodnight to one another had fallen into silence, when lights had begun to go out in upstairs windows that Marianne could see in the opposite wing. He entered quietly, embraced Ellat, then sat on the edge of Marianne’s bed. ‘Isn’t this ridiculous?’ he asked. ‘I invite a lovely young woman for a weekend’s visit, all quite properly chaperoned by my sister. I invite her brother, too, because I am curious, and an old antagonist of mine, because I am proud, and suddenly all turns to slime and wickedness. You find it difficult to believe, don’t you? Well, so do I, and I have less excuse than you do. Marianne, my dear, will you rise at dawn, please, and go down to the stables where Aghrehond will meet you and take you away from here. Leave your bags. I will bring them when I meet you later in the day to drive you home, as promised. There are too many currents here, too many eddies of greed and passion. Tell me, Marianne, would … would your half brother benefit in any material way if harm came to you?’

  Her throat went dry, harsh as sandpaper. She had had those thoughts, had banished them, had put them down, ‘buried, begone’ in her own litany, but they lunged upward now like corpses long drowned and broken free of some weight to rise hideously through slimed water to the surface. She cried out at the horror of it, all at once weeping in a steady flow. Ellat took her into her arms and held her, saying ‘Shh, shh. He shouldn’t have asked it so abruptly like that. But you don’t protest, Marianne. You don’t protest?’

  ‘No,’ she cried. ‘I can’t protest, Ellat. I’ve thought it too many times. I thought I was wicked to think such a thing, only a wicked, angry child. But, oh, if I died, he would get all that Mama left me – it’s all tied up in Papa Zahmani’s estate, and my share of Papa’s estate, too. It’s a lot. More than I ever wanted or expected. More than anyone could need.’