Feast of Chaos (Four Feasts Till Darkness Book 3) (28 page)

“Fathers…” she muttered, then let the whole truth leak out. “I lost mine, shortly after I’d found him. He was one of those damned by the secrets they kept. Vortigern Thule…that was my father’s name, and he was the reborn you mentioned. He was Sorren’s brother—the man who kidnapped me, if you recall…Both men are Thackery’s nephews, Gloriatrix’s sons. It’s all such a glorious mess.”

An astounding confession. Here was the lost heiress to the Blackbriar fortune, the granddaughter of the Iron Queen, a child rumored to have died of a fever. Here was a royal offspring who’d surely been shuffled into hiding amid the politics and paperwork of Gloriatrix’s Charter for Freedom. Little wonder, thought Moreth, that the Iron Queen had ordered him to support this seemingly charitable cause. Such a lapse from mercilessness made sense now that he knew a child of her own blood was involved.

Tucking away his kerchief, which had been left dangling in the wind for a moment, Moreth walked onward, tipping his head toward Mouse to follow. “Fathers…” he said. “It sounds as if you loved yours. I would say that it is better to have loved deeply and briefly than never to have loved at all. When I think of my father’s death, it is only to regret it did not happen sooner, for he was such a wanton wastrel of a man.”

“I…Thank you, that’s kind of you to say. What you said about my father, I mean, not yours.”

The pair, and the changeling stalking them, had fallen behind the others and now hastened to catch up, while still keeping to themselves. Adam left the pair and joined Talwyn in beating down whatever brush the Wolf hadn’t crushed with his stomping. Mouse discovered that the Menosian’s company was oddly relaxing. Moreth spoke with a shrewd elegance, unadorned and unsentimental. His was the acerbic candor of her people, and he possessed a conversational savvy that she had missed. Perhaps Moreth felt homesick, too, or more at ease with a fellow countryman, for he began to open up. Or perhaps speaking of fathers had loosened the bolt on the door, keeping in many forgotten memories from his childhood. Frank and often bitterly funny, Moreth wove for Mouse a tale of an age of grotesque decadence: The Age of Discovery.

Stunning breakthroughs in technomagik had occurred in quick succession. Within one decade, organ transplants, skin swapping, and even spinal and nerve tissue replacements were being performed without causing crippling, adverse effects. Any piece of a man could be traded with any other, down to his prick and the market for sizable slave genitalia suddenly boomed. The advancements in fleshcrafting made it possible for a man to live three or more times his natural years. For the first time in history, man stood within reach of the Immortals. Beyond these medical
wonders, Menos had profited from the height of its Iron Valley excavations (it would be many years before the great quake would shake humility into the ancient masters). Never had the Iron City been so bursting with wealth or so in demand by those eager to trade for Menosian secrets. Into this era, Moreth Eustache El had been born.

Which makes you about two hundred years old, give or take
, thought Mouse. The fleshcrafting wonders conceived during that age had served Moreth well.

“You wouldn’t believe the parties,” he said, laughing wickedly. “Fountains of liquid ether, flavored with whatever was then the voguish narcotic. Grab a glass and hallucinate to your heart’s content. Chase a golden faery out a window, race with your long-dead lover down a flight of stairs and probably break your neck…You know how our people are, we like our death. It wasn’t a proper party unless at least one person died by misadventure. Perhaps food, and not mayhem, was your pleasure instead. In that case, you could wander to any hall in one of my father’s soirees and take your pick of pickled oesterich eggs, Alabion tufted wildcat, or black-tailed pheasant—species nearing extinction at the time, and surely living only in the history books now. But that was the allure. Without the rarity, the taste was not worth having. This applied to appetites of passion, too, and as he was a merchant in blood, my father often rang a gong to clear the great hall, then made ten or twenty of his warriors gut and decapitate each other on our beautiful Basadora marble floors. Last man standing, and all that. Our house staff would spend days cleaning the hall afterwards. Blood soaks right into untreated stone, you see, and innards can fly as high as chandeliers. Where Father truly outdid himself with perversion, though, was with his showstopping orgies. Come the peak of the evening’s intoxication, naked slaves would be brought forth, oftentimes to the same gory battlefield as father’s gladiators. The poor souls would stand there, pumped like breeding livestock full of aphrodisiacs, the men’s rods raging, the women fondling their breasts. Then the slaves would be forced to fuk—well, not really
forced
, considering their states. The slaves would engage in rabid pleasure before an audience of esteemed perverts that usually fuked and fondled themselves as well. Most of the slaves were so inebriated and foreign that they did not realize there would be a cruel endgame to their
exhibitionism. The slaves didn’t understand that Menosians are aroused primarily by violence; if the savages did figure that out, they never stopped fuking anyway, not even as molten feliron was poured upon them from on high, and chanting earthspeakers cast and set their bodies into horrific erotic reliefs. The slaves screamed in pleasure and then finally in terror as they died. I still remember their noises and the murmurs of the spellcasters—like a priest’s chanting, which I now hate—echoing up through the halls of the El estate. For a time, until I inherited the House of El, Father kept a wing filled with his pornographic iron trophies.”

Mouse almost pitied the master, although he seemed dismissive of pity, as if it would be beneath him. Far more astonishing than the violent debauchery Moreth had witnessed as a child was the apparent disgust he felt at this cycle of entitlement and sin.

“To the disappointment of many, I did not continue my father’s ways,” he said. “Those heinous traditions died with him,” said Moreth. “My Blood Pits had men of valor, men fighting to break the system that had enslaved them. We all deserve a chance to be something better than what Fate demands we should be.”

“I agree,” said Mouse.

They walked in silence for a few specks, then Moreth spoke softly. “Nearly every night since the fall of Menos, I have thought of what comes next for what’s left of the Iron City, and for our people. I think about our soul, mostly, as all else has been lost—our wealth, our technomagik, our culture. All those things must be rebuilt, but our soul—made of our faith and our endurance—is our only virtue, and we must not lose it. I’d like to believe that when Menos rises again, we shall do more than find new ways to destroy our morality. I’d like to think that we shall…”

Mouse finished his thought. “Not be so fuking terrible?”

Moreth cackled.

V

For the remainder of the day, the company hiked with caution, worried that the Red Riders might return. As evening covered the land in a cool crimson glow, they camped at the base of a muddy cliff. Reaching the top would involve great exertion: to inspire his pack, the Wolf hunted and
killed several quill beasts and then started a cooking fire. While they sat and ate their dinner, a few of the company found themselves rubbing their shoulders and huddling closer to the Wolf or the flames. At last, the first white flake fluttered down and landed, then melted, upon Mouse’s cheek. Neither she nor the others found the arrival of snow surprising. “I guess we should bundle up,” she said.

The idea of wandering amid a snowy wonderland appealed to Mouse; they had never had much snow in Menos, only gray slush at the best of times. Eager to meet the snow, she left what remained of her meal, threw on the heavy garments she’d packed away, and began her ascent. The company soon followed her. As the Wolf had anticipated, this climb was harder than the ones that had come before; the sloped wall rose taller and grabbable roots were scarce. Often the companions had to kick and dig for footholds and handholds in the cold, dense soil. Winter awaited them above, and the company finished the climb with fingers numb and pale. Afterward, they stood breathless, collecting themselves before going on. There seemed to be only one path this time, and not the cornucopia of choices, colors, and terrains with which Pandemonia usually presented its travelers.

Ahead of them, grass surrendered to great black tiles of stone that tilted like fallen dominos. Frost consumed the land, and the path looked glassy and precarious. In the distance, the black tiles turned gray, then white, and were soon buried in snow. As for the storm that had caused this massive snowfall, it seemed dormant in the strange evening sky; the clouds were a shade between purple and blue and flickered as if with fireflies. The storm would be dangerous when again unleashed. However, they all sensed this was the way to go—this was the way to Eatoth.

A nasty-tempered wind rudely assaulted the company, and they pulled their hoods and cloaks tight. In the bluster, Mouse didn’t notice Adam undressing until his clothing was thrown in a pile at her feet; Thackery did him the courtesy of collecting it. A moment later, after a little screaming and growling, a lean brown wolf panted by her side.

“I think Adam has the right idea,” said the Wolf. “I, too, would serve us better in my other skin. The night is dark, and I sense something wicked ahead.”

Something wicked? They watched the miracle and spectacle of the Wolf as he undressed and then started bristling with muscle, hair, fangs, and claws. Even the unflappable Moreth felt an unfamiliar reverence, shaking uncontrollably when a rending howl tore from the Wolf at the climax of his transformation. Morigan calmly retrieved the discarded clothing of her lover while the huge ebon monster looked around with his paralyzing gray stare. The bits of crystal braided into his hair by the faeries in Alabion glittered about his head in a mane of diamonds. He was beautiful and terrible. The Wolf barked, then turned and padded over the uneven land.

“That means we follow,” said Mouse. “Let’s go.”

“Oh, yes…Yes,” mumbled Moreth, who’d forgotten how to walk for a moment. “He’s bigger than a horse…Bigger than an ox…than two oxen, even.”

“You should have seen his mother,” quipped Talwyn.

A hard push lay ahead. The storm conspired to fight them, and an hourglass into their trek the clouds flashed and released flurries and wind. Against the whirling paleness of the land, the Wolf’s black hide was easy to spot, even when obscurity claimed all else. At times, Adam strayed ahead with the Wolf, or ran in circles around the rest of the pack like a dutiful sheepdog to ensure no one would be lost. Making a chain, the two-legged company held tight to one another with blue hands, took careful steps in unison, and focused on the black dot of their pack-master. They were united and strong: no one tripped or allowed despair to sink into their bones along with the chill. Eventually, the daze of traveling up and down over irregular snowdrifts ended, and a brown wolf was nudging them down a gully formed by two of the giant stone dominos, which had fallen against each other, creating a formation like a lean-to. Here the snowfall was lighter, and the company had a moment’s grace from the elements. They huddled together and warmed their hands. Moreth, the only one clever enough to have brought gloves, chose not to gloat.

Of the changelings, only Adam was present, thumping his tail. The Wolf had not joined the company inside their stone tent.

“Where is Caenith?” Moreth asked.

“He’s…caught wind of something,” Morigan replied, her attention divided between Moreth and her bloodmate, wherever he had gone. “Blood.”

As the company had seen neither hide nor hair of another living creature in this snowy wasteland, Morigan’s news came as a shock. Tense, and slowly warmed by their excited heartbeats, the six waited for the Wolf to return. Moreth thought he saw a dark flicker, and then the Wolf’s blackness materialized out of a sheer white curtain; the storm was growing only more furious. The Wolf spat an ice-coated length of something out onto the ground, and it rolled in the fluff. Then the Wolf began to lap at a mound of snow. He swallowed none of it—it was as if he were cleaning his mouth of a taste. The Wolf did not seem inclined to revert to a man, so Morigan acted as his voice. “He says there are bodies up ahead. Corpses that have been mostly buried by the weather. He had to dig to find the remains. He took this from the dead.”

Scowling, the seer kicked the object her bloodmate had discarded, sending it rolling toward the company. She didn’t want to touch it. Some of the snow tumbled off, and the companions saw a frozen L of an arm, snapped and pink at its cleanly broken-off shoulder. The limb looked as if it had once belonged to one who had practiced scarification and burning, for the skin was patterned, mottled, and mostly black, though possibly this was due to the temperature. Even from afar, they could smell its snuffed, wet odor, which curdled next to the Wolf’s strong, comforting musk.

Talwyn stated the obvious. “That’s an arm.”

“Yes, but to whom did it once belong?” asked Thackery.

“A Red Rider,” replied Morigan. “Can’t you tell? The stain on the skin and those scars were caused by the corruption bleeding from within. I shan’t tell you what that stain looks like, what it
feels
like, to my senses.”

“All right…” said Thackery, rubbing the seer’s shoulders as she trembled. “Are these our would-be hunters? The ones from whom we escaped earlier?”

The bees stung Morigan with a truth. “Yes. All six of them…No…More than six…” Kneeling and ignoring her revulsion, she grabbed the scorched, dead thing. A vision entered her mind.

A dozen riders wander the waste of snow and ice—six red slashes moving toward six dots of red through the endless white. The Red Riders have not abandoned their pursuit, no: they have left to gather more of their swarm. Six have met with six who will meet with six, and so the cycle goes. Mother
Elemech had once compared Zionae’s army to Oroborax, the snake that eats itself. Far as he is from his fallen seat of power in the West, the Sun King has built a new horde
.