Part 39 (1/2)
”You wanted the truth.”
”I'm not saying I believe you.”
”That other place is the Metacosm. That species is the Iad Uroboros. They exist.”
”And the appet.i.tes?” she said, not certain she really wanted to know.
”For purity. For singularity. For madness. ”
”Some hunger.”
”You were right when you accused me of not telling the truth. I told a part of it only. The Shoal did stand guard at the sh.o.r.es of Quiddity to prevent the Art from being misused by human ambition; but it also stood to watch the sea...”
”For an invasion?”
”That's what we feared. Maybe even expected. It wasn't simply our paranoia. The profoundest dreams of evil are those in which we scent the Iad across Quiddity. The deepest terrors, the foulest imaginings that haunt human heads are the echoes of their echoes. I am giving you more reason to be afraid, Tesla, than you could hear from any other lips. I'm telling you what only the strongest psyches can bear.”
”Is there any good news?” Tesla said.
”Who ever promised that? Who ever said there'd be good news?”
”Jesus,” she replied. ”And Buddha. Mohammed.”
”Fragments of stories, ma.s.saged into cults by the Shoal. Distractions.”
”I can't believe that.”
”Why not? Are you a Christian?”
”No.”
”Buddhist? Muslim? Hindu?”
”No. No. No.”
”But you insist on believing the good news anyway,” Kissoon said. ”Convenient.”
She felt she'd been struck, very hard, across the face, by a teacher who'd been three or four steps ahead of her throughout the entire argument, leading her steadily and stealthily to a place where she could not help but mouth absurdities. And absurd it was, to cling to hopes for Heaven when she poured p.i.s.s on every religion that pa.s.sed beneath her window. But she reeled not because Kissoon had scored a solid debating point. She'd taken her lumps in countless arguments, and come back to give worse. What made her sick to her stomach was that her defense against so much else he'd said was forfeit at the same moment. If even a part of what he'd told her was true, and the world she lived in-the Cosm-was in jeopardy, then what right did she have to value her little life over his desperate need for a.s.sistance? Even a.s.suming she could find her way out of this time out of time she couldn't return to the world without wondering every moment if in leaving him she'd lost the Cosm's one chance for survival. She had to stay; had to give herself over to him, not because she entirely believed him, but because she couldn't risk being wrong.
”Don't be afraid,” she heard him say. ”The situation's no worse than it was five minutes ago, when you were quite the debater. You just know the truth now.”
”Not much comfort,” she said.
”No,” he replied softly. ”I do see that. And you must see that this burden has been hard to carry alone, and that without a.s.sistance my back'll break.”
”I understand,” she said.
She'd stepped away from the fire, and was standing against the wall of the hut, both for its support and for its coolness against her spine. Leaning there, she stared at the ground, aware that Kissoon had started to stand up. She didn't look at him, but she heard his grunts. And then his request.
”I need to occupy your body,” he said. ”Which means, I'm afraid, that you must vacate it.”
The fire had dwindled to almost nothing, but its smoke was thickening. It pressed the top of her skull, making it impossible for her to raise her head and look at him even if she'd wanted to. She started to tremble. First her knees, then her fingers. Kissoon continued to talk as he approached. She heard his soft shuffling.
”This won't hurt,” he said. ”If you just stand still, and keep your eyes on the ground-”
A slow thought came: was he making the smoke heavy, by some means, in order to stop her looking at him?
”It'll be over quickly-”
He sounds like an anesthetist, she thought. The trembling intensified. The smoke pressed more heavily upon her the closer he came. She was certain now that this was indeed his doing. He didn't want her looking up at him. Why? Was he coming at her with knives, to scoop out her brain so he could slip in behind her eyes?
Resisting curiosity had never been one of her stronger points. The closer he came the more she wanted to push against the weight of smoke, and look directly at him. But it was difficult. Her body was weak, as though her blood had gone to dishwater. The smoke was like a lead hat; its brim too tight around her brow. The harder she pushed, the heavier it became.
He really doesn't want me to look, she thought, that thought feeding her pa.s.sion to do so. She braced herself against the wall. He was within two yards of her now. She could smell him; his sweat was bitter and stale. Push, she told herself, pus.h.!.+ It's only smoke. He's making you think you're being crushed, but it's only smoke.
”Relax,” he murmured; the anesthetist again.
Instead she put one last surge of effort into raising her head. The lead hat dug into her temples; her skull creaked beneath the weight of the crown. But her head moved, trembling as she fought the weight. Once begun, the motion became easier. She lifted her chin an inch, then another two, raising her eyes at the same moment until she was looking straight at him.
Standing, he was crooked in every place but one, each joint and juncture a little askew, shoulder on neck, hand on arm; thigh on hip, a zig-zag with a single straight line prodding from his groin. She stared, appalled.
”What the f.u.c.k's that for?” she said.
”Couldn't help myself,” he said. ”I'm sorry.”
”Oh yeah?”
”When I said I want your body, I don't mean that way.”
”Where have I heard that before?”
”Believe me,” he said. ”It's just my flesh responding to yours. Automatic. Be flattered.”
She might have laughed, in different circ.u.mstances. Had she been able to open the door and walk away, for instance, instead of being lost out of time, with a beast on the threshold and a desert beyond. Every time she thought she had a grasp of what was going on here she lost it again. The man was one surprise after another, and none of them pleasant.
He reached towards her, his pupils vast, crowding out the whites. She thought of Raul; of how there was beauty in his gaze, despite his hybrid's face. There was no beauty here; nothing even vaguely readable. No appet.i.te; no anger. If there was feeling at all, it was eclipsed.
”I can't do this,” she said.
”You must. Give up the body. I have to have the body or the Iad wins. You want that?”
”No!”
”Then stop resisting. Your spirit'll be safe in Trinity.”
”Where?”
Momentarily he let something show in his eyes, a spark of fury-self-directed, she thought.
”Trinity:'” she said, throwing the question out to delay his touching and claiming her. ”What's Trinity?”