He frowned. No. I sleep enough at night
Sleep now, I said, and he crumpled onto his side so swiftly that I might have laughed under other circumstances. I walked over to the bed, lifted his legs onto it and arranged him for comfort, then knelt beside it, putting my mouth near his ear.
Have pleasant dreams, I commanded. The frown that had been on his face altered subtly, smoothing and softening.
Satisfied, I got to my feet and went back to the window, to wait.
* * *
Why cant I remember what happened next?
You are remembering
No, why cant I remember it now? As I talk through it, it comes back to me, but only then. Without that theres an empty space. A great dark hole.
You are remembering.
* * *
The instant the suns red curve sank below the horizon, the room shook, and with it the whole palace. This close, the vibration was powerful enough to make my teeth rattle. A line seemed to sweep the room, moving outward from behind me, and when this line passed, the room was darker. I waited, and when the hairs prickled on the back of my neck, I spoke. Good evening, Lord Nahadoth. Are you feeling better?
My only answer was a low, shuddering exhalation. The evening sky was still heavily stroked with sunlight, golds and reds and violets as deep as jewels. He was not himself yet.
I turned. He was sitting up. He still looked human, ordinary, but I could see his hair wafting around him, though there was no breeze. As I watched it thickened, lengthened, darkened, spinning itself into the cloak of night. Fascinating, and beautiful. He had averted his face from the lingering sunlight and did not see me approach until I was right there. Then he looked up, raising a hand as if to shield himself. From me? I wondered, and smiled.
The hand trembled as I watched. I took it, reassured by the cool dryness of his skin. (His skin was brown now, I noticed. My doing?) Beyond the hand his eyes watched me, black now, and unblinking. Unthinking, like those of a beast.
I cupped his cheek and willed him sane. He blinked, frowned slightly, then stared at me as his confusion cleared. His hand in mine became still.
When I judged the moment right, I let go his hand. Unfastened my blouse, and slipped it off my shoulders. I unhitched the skirt and let it fall, along with my underclothes. Naked, I waited, an offering.
24
If I Ask
AND THENTHEN
You remember.
No. No, I dont.
Why are you afraid?
I dont know.
Did he hurt you?
I dont remember!
You do. Think, child. I made you stronger than this. What were the sounds? The scents? What do the memories feel like?
Like like summer.
Yes. Humid, thick, those summertime nights. Did you knowthe earth absorbs all the days heat, and gives it back in the dark hours. All that energy just hovers in the air, waiting to be used. It slickens the skin. Open your mouth and it curls around your tongue.
I remember. Oh, gods, I remember.
I knew you would.
* * *
The shadows in the room seemed to deepen as the Nightlord rose to his feet. He loomed over me, and for the first time I could not see his eyes in the dark.
Why? he asked.
You never answered my question.
Question?
Whether you would kill me, if I asked.
I wont pretend I wasnt afraid. That was part of itmy pounding heart, the quickness of my breath. Esui, the thrill of danger. But then he reached out, so slowly that I worried I was dreaming, and trailed his fingertips up my arm. Just that one touch and my fear became something entirely different. Gods. Goddess.
White teeth flashed at me, startling in the darkness. Oh, yes, this was far beyond mere danger.
Yes, he said. If you asked, I would kill you.
Just like that?
You seek to control your death as you cannot control your life. I understand this. So much unspoken meaning in that brief pause. I wondered, suddenly, whether the Nightlord had ever yearned to die.
I didnt think you wanted me to control my death.
No, little pawn. I tried to concentrate on his words while his hand continued its slow journey up my arm, but it was difficult. I am only human. It is Itempass way to force his will upon others. I have always preferred willing sacrifices.
He drew one fingertip along my collarbone now, and I nearly moved away because it felt almost unbearably good. I did not because I had seen his teeth. One did not run from a predator.
I I knew you would say yes. My voice shook. I was babbling. I dont know how, but I knew. I knew That I was more than a pawn to you. But no, that part I could not say.
I must be what I am. He said it as if the words made sense. Now. Are you asking?
I licked my lips, hungry. Not to die. Butfor you. Yes. Im asking for you.
To have me is to die, he warned me, even as he grazed my breast with the backs of his fingers. The knuckles caught on my already-taut nipple and I could not help gasping. The room got darker.
But one thought pushed up through the desire. It was the thought that had motivated me to do this mad thing, because in spite of everything I was not suicidal. I wanted to live for whatever pittance of time I had left. In the same way I hated the Arameri, yet I sought to understand them; I wanted to prevent a second Gods War, yet I also wanted the Enefadeh freed. I wanted so many things, each of them contradictory, all of them together impossible. I wanted them anyway. Perhaps Siehs childishness had infected me.
Once you took many mortal lovers, I said. My voice was more breathy than it should have been. He leaned close to me and inhaled, as if scenting it. Once you claimed them by the dozen, and they all lived to tell the tale.
That was before centuries of human hatred made me a monster, said the Nightlord, and for a moment his voice was sad. I had used the same word for him myself, but it felt strange and wrong to hear him say it. Before my brother stole whatever tenderness there once was in my soul.
And just like that, my fear faded.
No, I said.
His hand paused. I reached up and caught it, my fingers tangling in his.
Your tenderness isnt gone, Nahadoth. Ive seen it. Ive tasted it. I pulled his hand up, up, to touch my lips. I felt his fingers twitch, as if in surprise. Youre right about me; if I must die, I want to die on my own terms. There are so many things I will never dobut this I can have. You. I kissed his fingers. Will you show me that tenderness again, Nightlord? Please?
From the corner of my eye I saw movement. When I turned my head there were black lines, curling and random, etching their way along the walls, the windows, the floor. The lines flowed out from Nahadoths feet, spreading, overlapping. I caught a glimpse of strange, airy depths within the lines; a suggestion of drifting mist and deep, endless chasms. He let out a low, soughing breath, and it curled around my tongue.
I need so much, he whispered. It has been so long since I shared that part of myself, Yeine. I hungerI always hunger. I devour myself with hunger. But Itempas has betrayed me, and you are not Enefa, and I I am afraid.
Tears stung my eyes. Reaching up, I cupped his face in my hands and pulled him down to me. His lips were cool, and this time they tasted of salt. I thought I felt him shiver. I will give you all I can, I said, when we parted.
He pressed his forehead against mine; he was breathing hard. You must say the words. I will try to be what I was, I will try, but He groaned softly, desperate. Say the words!
I closed my eyes. How many of my Arameri ancestors had said these words and died? I smiled. It would be a death befitting a Darre, if I joined them.
Do with me as you please, Nightlord, I whispered.
Hands seized me.
I do not say his hands because there were too many of them, gripping my arms and grasping my hips and tangling in my hair. One even curled round my ankle. The room was almost entirely dark. I could see nothing except the window and the sky b
eyond, where the suns light had finally faded completely. Stars spun as I was lifted and lowered until I felt the bed underneath my back.
Then we fed each others hunger. Wherever I wanted to be touched, he touched; I dont know how he knew. Whenever I touched him, there was a delay. I would cup emptiness before it became a smooth muscled arm. I would wrap my legs around nothing and only then find hips settled there, taut with ready energy. In this way I shaped him, making him suit my fantasies; in this way he chose to be shaped. When heavy, thick warmth pushed into me, I had no idea whether this was a penis or some entirely different phallus that only gods possessed. I suspect the latter, since no mere penis can fill a womans body the way he filled mine. Size had nothing to do with it. This time he let me scream.
Yeine Through the haze of my own body heat I was aware of few things. The clouds, racing across the stars. The black lines, webbing the rooms ceiling, widening and melding into one great yawning abyss. The rising urgency of Nahadoths movements. There was pain now, because I wanted it. Yeine. Open yourself to me.
I had no idea what he meant; I could not think. But he gripped my hair and slid a hand under my hips, pulling me tighter against him in a way that sent me spiraling again. Yeine!
Such need in him. Such woundstwo of them, raw and unhealing, for two lost lovers. So much more than one mortal girl could ever satisfy.
And yet in my madness, I tried. I couldnt; I was only human. But for that moment I yearned to be more, give more, because I loved him.
I loved him.
Nahadoth arched up, away from me. In the last starlight I caught a glimpse of a smooth, perfect body, taut-muscled and sleek with sweat all the way down to where it joined with mine. He had flung back his hair in an arc. His face was all tight-clenched eyes and open mouth and that delicious near-agony expression men make when the moment strikes. The black lines joined, and nothingness enclosed us.
Then we fell.
no, no, we flew, not downward but forward, into the dark. There were streaks within this darkness, thin random lines of white and gold and red and blue. I put out my hand in fascination and snatched it back when something stung the fingertips. I looked and found them wet with glimmering stuff that spun with tiny orbiting motes. Then Nahadoth cried out, his body shuddering, and now we went up
past endless stars, past countless worlds, through layers of light and glowing cloud. Up and up we went, our speed impossible, our size incomprehensible. We left the light behind and kept going, passing through stranger things than mere worlds. Geometric shapes that twisted and gibbered. A white landscape of frozen explosions. Shivering lines of intention that turned to chase us. Vast, whalelike beings with terrifying eyes and the faces of long-lost friends.
I closed my eyes. I had to. Yet the images continued, because in this place I had no eyelids to close. I was immense, and still growing. I had a million legs, two million arms. I dont know what I became in that place Nahadoth took me, because there are things no mortal is meant to do or be or comprehend, and I encompassed all of them.
Something familiar: that darkness which is Nahadoths quintessence. It surrounded me, pressed in, until I had no choice but to yield to it. I felt things in mesanity? self?stretch, growing so taut that a touch would break them. This was the end, then. I was not afraid, not even when I became aware of a sound: a titanic, awful roar. I cannot describe it except to say something of that roar was in Nahadoths voice as he shouted again. I knew then that his ecstasy had taken us beyond the universe, and now we approached the Maelstrom, birthplace of gods. It would tear me apart.
Then, just when the roar had become so terrible that I knew I could bear no more, we stopped. Hovered, pent.
And then we fell again through gibbering strangeness and layered dark and whirlpools of light and dancing globes toward one globe in particular, blue-green and beautiful. There was a new roaring as we streaked down through air, trailing white-hot fire. Something glowing and pale reared up, puny then enormous, all spikes and white stone and treacherySky, it was Skyand it swallowed us whole.
I think I screamed again as, naked, skin steaming, I smashed into my bed. The shock wave of impact swept the room; the sound of it was the Maelstrom come to earth. I knew no more.
25
A Chance
HE SHOULDVE KILLED ME THAT NIGHT. It would have been easier.
Thats selfish of you.
What?
He gave you his body. He gave you pleasure no mortal lover can match. He fought his own nature to keep you alive, and you wish he hadnt bothered.
I didnt mean
Yes, you did. Oh, child. You think you love him? You think youre worthy of his love?
I cant speak for him. But I know what I feel.
Dont be a
And I know what I hear. Jealousy does not become you.
What?
This is why youre so angry with me, isnt it? Youre just like Itempas, you cant bear to share
Be silent!
but it isnt necessary. Dont you see? He has never stopped loving you. He never will. You and Itempas will always hold his heart in your hands.
Yes. That is true. But I am dead, and Itempas is mad.
And I am dying. Poor Nahadoth.
Poor Nahadoth, and poor us.
* * *
I woke slowly, aware first of warmth and comfort. Sunlight shone against the side of my face, red through one of my eyelids. A hand rubbed my back in little arcs.
I opened my eyes and did not understand what I saw at first. A white, rolling surface. I had fleeting memories of something else like itfrozen explosionsand then the memories swam away, deeper into my consciousness and out of reach. For a moment understanding lingered: I was mortal, not ready for some knowledge. Then even that vanished, and I was myself again. I was wearing a plush robe. I was sitting in someones lap. Frowning, I lifted my head.
Nahadoths daytime form gazed back at me with frank, too-human eyes.
I did not think, half-falling and half-leaping off his lap and rolling to my feet. He rose with me and a taut moment passed, me staring, him just standing there.
The moment broke when he turned to the small nightstand, on which sat a gleaming silver tea service. He poured, the small liquid sound making me flinch for reasons I did not understand, and then held the cup forward, offering it to me.
I stood naked before him, an offering
Gone, like fish in a pond.
How do you feel? he asked. I flinched again, not sure I understood the words. How did I feel? Warm. Safe. Clean. I lifted a hand, sniffed my wrist; I smelled of soap.
I bathed you. I hope youll forgive the liberty. Low, soft, his voice, as if he spoke to a skittish mare. He looked different from the day beforehealthier for one, but also browner, like a Darre man. You were so deeply asleep that you didnt wake. I found the robe in the closet.
I hadnt known I had a robe. Belatedly it came to me that he was still holding out the cup of tea. I took it, more out of politeness than any real interest. When I sipped, I was surprised to find it lukewarm and rich with cooling mint and calmative herbs. It made me realize I was thirsty; I drank it down greedily. Naha held out the pot, silently offering more, and I let him pour.
What a wonder you are, he murmured, as I drank. Noise. He was staring and it bothered me. I looked away to shut him out and savored the tea.
You were ice cold when I woke up, and filthy. There was somethingsoot, I thinkall over you. The bath seemed to warm you up, and that helped, too. He jerked his head toward the chair where wed been sitting. There wasnt anywhere else, so
The bed, I said, and flinched again. My voice was hoarse, my throat raw and sore. The mint helped.
For an instant Naha paused, his lips quirking with a hint of his usual cruelty. The bed wouldnt have worked.
Puzzled, I looked past him, and caught my breath. The bed was a wreck, sagging on a split frame and broken legs. The mattress looked as though it had been hacked by a sword and then set afire. Loose goosedown and c
harred fabric scraps littered the room.
It was more than the bed. One of the rooms huge glass windows had spiderwebbed; only luck that it hadnt shattered. The vanity mirror had. One of my bookcases lay on the floor, its contents scattered but intact. (I saw my fathers book there, with great relief.) The other bookcase had been shattered into kindling, along with most of the books on it.
Naha took the empty teacup from my hand before I could drop it. Youll need to get one of your Enefadeh friends to fix this. I kept the servants out this morning, but that wont work for long.
I I dont I shook my head. So much of what had happened was dreamlike in my memory, more metaphysical than actual. I remembered falling. There was no hole in the ceiling. Yet, the bed.
Naha said nothing as I moved about the room, my slippered feet crunching on glass and splinters. When I picked up a shard of the mirror, staring at my own face, he said, You dont look as much like the library mural as Id first thought.
That turned me around to face him. He smiled at me. I had thought him human, but no. He had lived too long and too strangely, knew too much. Perhaps he was more like the demons of old, half mortal and half something else.
How long have you known? I asked.
Since we met. His lips quirked. Though that cant properly be called a meeting, granted.
He had stopped and stared at me, that first evening in Sky. Id forgotten in the rush of terror afterward. Then later in Sciminas quartersYoure a good actor.
I have to be. His smile was gone now. Even then, I wasnt sure. Not until I woke up and saw this. He gestured around the devastated room. And you there beside me, alive.
I didnt expect to be. But I was, and now I would have to deal with the consequences.
Im not her, I said.
No. But Ill wager youre a part of her, or shes a part of you. I know a little about these things. He ran a hand through his unruly black locks. Just hair, and not the smokelike curls of his godly self, but his meaning was plain.