Steel Sky (22 page)

“Of course not. I only wonder if your suppression is as effective as you think it is. When your little crusade is over, will the crime rate actually be any lower than when you started?”

“
Enough
.” The sharpness in the Winnower’s voice makes Kitt edge back in her seat. She has finally succeeded in making him angry. “This is leading nowhere,” the voice growls. “Do you have information for me or not?”

“As a matter of fact, I do. And now that we’ve had a pleasant little chat, I’ll be happy to share it with you. See? That wasn’t so difficult, was it?”

“What do you have?”

Kitt sighs. The man is utterly without humor. “Lem Comfrey,” she says. “Heard of him?”

“Should I have?”

“He’s a palaestran. He was popular a year ago, but now he’s lost his favor. He was fired a few days ago.”

“And?”

“He’s decided to kill himself. He’s locked himself in his domus and commed a few friends to say goodbye. His trademark as a palaestran was his use of knives and swords. I imagine that’s how he’ll try to kill himself. Or ‘
journey into the Stone
,’ as he puts it. He’s suddenly become devout.”

“Why should I care about this?”

“Because he’s decided to take his girlfriend with him.”

TRUE LOVE

“Put me down! By Koba’s eyes, I’ll make you sorry if you don’t put me down!”

Dancer is struggling with Second Son at the threshold of their father’s auxiliary suite, which he has lent them for their wedding night.

“I will not suffer this indignity! Put me down!”

“All right, if that’s what you want.” Dancer steps over the threshold and unceremoniously dumps Second Son on the floor. In a fit, he rolls away from her and jumps to his feet.

“I will not put up with any more of your abuse, Dancer!” he shouts, pointing at her. “Now that we’re married, things will change! I am the man in this relationship! I am the master!”

“Of course you are, dear.” Dancer brushes past him, pulling loose her black veil and letting it waft to the floor. At the window she turns. The bright light shining through the fabric of her dress reveals her athletic silhouette. Her leg muscles bunch each time she takes a step, then relax to perfect smoothness. She arches her back and peeks over her shoulder coquettishly. “It’s our honeymoon suite, darling. Aren’t you excited?”

Second Son throws his jacket on a table, the buttons click-clacking against the plastic. He has been in this suite before, and he doesn’t like it much. It does not have a lived-in feel. His father keeps it primarily to impress clients and mistresses. It is virtually at the apex of the Chandelier, the highest living space in the Hypogeum. Water pressure is low, and the light comes in almost horizontally. The Sun, which looks like a golden orb from below, is revealed here as a scratched and dusty saucer, flickering intermittently. Second Son can see the shadows of workmen climbing about inside it.

“No more games, Dancer. I’m in charge now.” Second Son balls both hands into fists. What happens at this moment, he realizes, will determine the shape of his future. If he does not assert dominance now, he will be a disgrace to the family forever.

“Is that any way to talk to your new bride?” Dancer smiles her infuriating smile. “Come here and give us a kiss.”

With his heart beating furiously, he forces himself to walk forward.
Remember what the instructor said,
he thinks.
Left to the head
.
Then, when her hands go up to protect her face, hit her as hard as you can in the stomach with your right. It’s the only language she understands. It’s the only way she’ll respect you
.

“No more games, Dancer,” he says.
Don’t be weak
, he thinks.
Remember how she locked you in the closet when you were six, how she pushed you down the stairs when you were nine.

“You just don’t get it, do you, Hump?” Dancer jeers at him, her hands on her hips. “It’s not just enough to
talk
like father. You have to
act
like him!”

With a yelp of anger, Second Son throws his fist forward at Dancer’s face. As her hands fly upward to protect her face, leaving her stomach exposed, he thinks elatedly,
it’s working! It’s actually going to work
! He pulls his other fist back for the crowning blow. Suddenly he realizes he is off balance. Dancer has grabbed his left hand and is pulling him forward. Frantically he tries to right himself, but she is pivoting around so he stumbles on top of her. She pushes up with her hip, while simultaneously tugging down on his arm. The room spins. Second Son lands flat on his back, hard enough to make the floor shudder. He is still trying to get his bearings and catch his breath when the side of her hand flashes down, striking his windpipe. Pain shoots down his back and through his whole body.

“That could have been a killing blow,” she says. Second Son writhes on the floor. He is in too much pain to even think about defending himself. Dancer jumps on top of him, straddling his chest, pinning his arms against his sides with her thighs. She looks down at him with a calm smile on her face. One earshell has been knocked loose, but otherwise she is still perfectly composed. Not a hair in her elaborate coiffure is out of place.

“You . . . aack . . . bitch,” he whispers past the pain in his throat. He tries to squirm loose, but her strong legs hold him pinned.

“You’ve said that before,” Dancer says, smiling. “You’re getting repetitive.” She shrugs out of her embroidered jacket. Her body is smooth and flawless above the bodice, her muscles sharply defined by the intimate sunlight. He can see her pulse beat delicately in her throat. A single drop of sweat travels down her chest, dipping into the hollow between her breasts, disappearing into the bodice.

“I’ve planned this for a long time, brother.” She laughs softly, easily, as if he weren’t there. “While you, apparently, can’t plan your next meal without a steering committee.” She reaches around to her back and undoes the clasp of her dress. Sequins glitter in the sun-light as she tosses it aside. She is naked now but for her bodice, underwear and slippers. As her weight settles on him, the muscles of her thighs encircling him, he feels an odd warmth, a heightening of the senses. That he should become aroused under these circumstances is the worst humiliation of all.

“Get off me,” he cries. His voice sounds pathetically weak.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” she says, stroking his cheek, her long fingernail barely touching his skin. “I’m not going to hurt you. Not too much.” She shifts herself backward, centered now over his groin, so that they are rubbing against one another like two kids too frightened to go all the way. Anger and desire mingle in his brain. This is one game he never played with her.

“You just need to understand who’s going to be in charge here, brother,” she murmurs. “Who’s going to be on top.” She grins. “Relax. Stop struggling. I think you’ll enjoy it.” Her perfume, her scent, envelops him. He is hypnotized by the rise and fall of her breath. As she inhales, her breasts strain forward against the bodice, then release again as she exhales. She pulls something loose from her hair. The elaborate coiffure comes undone, unfolding around her, a sunlit nimbus of amber.

The object she holds, Second Son sees, is a dagger. He thinks he should be frightened, or at least angry, but somehow he is not. The long dagger flashes downward, ripping open his shirt in one smooth motion. Her fingers slip under the ruined fabric, across his hairless chest. The blade flashes brilliantly, tearing his clothes to shreds. With her free hand, Dancer massages his pectoral as if it were a woman’s breast. His feeling of shame is abstract, distant, a mere accent to the wave of sensuality her touch brings him. He wonders why he never saw her beauty before. Her brilliant smile and piercing eyes scintillate with the great madness of the Orcus dynasty. The awe Second Son feels for her is almost religious in its intensity.

“That’s Stone’s dirk, isn’t it?” he asks. Dancer nods, her dark eyes solemn. Second Son closes his eyes, afraid that the wave of unnamable emotion washing over him will bring tears.

He hears the rip of cloth again, and when he opens his eyes she is naked above him. Her skin is flawless, more beautiful than he could ever have hoped for. Her tanned muscles are brightly etched by sunlight. She leans forward, so that her nipples brush against his chest. The point of her blade dimples the soft skin beneath his chin. “I’m going to let you go now,” she whispers. The tickle of her breath in his ear raises goosebumps from his empty follicles. “You can fight, or . . . you can be a good little boy.”

Her knees slide apart and Second Son slips his hands free. The muscles of her legs, which had been as hard as steel only a moment before, are warm and yielding. He moves his hands upward to her hipbones, watching his fingers grip them as if it were all on one of his monitors, as if it were all happening to someone else. He feels her hands reach down beneath him, pulling his leggings down around his thighs, and he is free. The past falls away, and the future opens before him, ripe with unimagined possibilities. He grips her hips still tighter, so tightly it will surely leave bruises. He guides her to him, and down. As her warmth envelops him, he hears her voice from very far away, saying, “I always knew that . . . deep down . . . you really loved me.”

THE WAY OF THE STONE

Rena Galliard sits in a chair in Lem Comfrey’s narrow domus with her hands tied behind her back. She has long since stopped trying to struggle free. Sweat makes her blond, shoulder-length hair stick to her forehead. She bends forward to rub it away from her eyes with her shoulder, but she cannot quite reach.

Lem is kneeling in the corner in front of a large Sacrament Rock. Two daubs of white paint, representing his spirit and Rena’s, are drying on its rough surface.

“Lem,” she says. “Please, let me go.”

“Quiet!” Lem closes his eyes tightly. His lips move silently as he completes the prayer.

“Please, Lem. There’s so many other things we can do. Just because you can’t fight in the Palaestra anymore doesn’t mean your life is over.”

Lem kisses the rock, giving it his breath. “It
is
over,” he says. “In the True Life, when we’re reunited in the Stone, you’ll see it’s best this way.”

He stands. He is dressed in his best palaestran uniform: green and gold patterned tights and a red shirt that is little more than a band across his chest, emphasizing its breadth. He walks across the room, stooping under the low concrete ceiling. He stops at a picture of himself in his younger, trimmer days. Beneath the picture is a wide cabinet. He pulls open the top drawer. The inside is filled with knives and short swords, all carefully arranged on red velour.

“Oh, Lem,” she says, a tremor in her voice. “Please, no.”

“Quiet, Rena. ‘
Weak spirits make weak stone
,’” he quotes. He selects one of the knives, feeling the edge with his thumb. He moves towards her.

“Lem, put the knife down. Stop it!”

He puts a finger to her lips, silencing her. “
The Way of the Stone is silence
,” he intones. “
The Way of the Stone is strength
.”

The air around Rena shimmers, as if with a sudden wave of heat. “Hello, Lem,” says a soft voice from behind her. Lem’s jaw sags, eyes widening in surprise. He takes a step backward. Twisting in her seat, Rena sees a bone-white gauntlet, the fingers sharpened like spear points, resting on the back of her chair.

Suddenly the chair rocks backward, the Winnower using it as a brace to launch himself at Lem. His heel cracks into Lem’s cheekbone. Lem staggers backward, blood spurting from the gash. The knife flies out of his hand and skitters across the floor. His head knocks hard against the wall behind him.

The Winnower lands in a crouch at the center of the tiny room. “Don’t fight me, Lem,” he says. “If you want to die so badly, I’ll do all the work for you.”

Lem shakes his head and rises to one knee. He eyes the knife in the corner where it has come to rest, seeming to judge if he can reach it before the Winnower can reach him.

The Winnower’s dark eyes turn in the direction of Lem’s gaze, also appraising Lem’s chances. He sways to one side, preparing to jump. “Or maybe death isn’t really what you’re after,” he hisses. “Maybe you just wanted the attention.”

With a cry of anger, Lem lunges for the knife. Before he is even halfway across the room, the Winnower crashes into him, throwing him against the wall. As he tumbles back, Lem twists in his grasp and locks his arms around the armored figure, squeezing hard. This was always his signature move in the Palaestra. Other men were faster, other men were better strategists, but few men ever broke his grip.

The two men wrestle in the shadows. The Winnower gives a cry of pain as Lem squeezes his arms together. The metal of his breastplate groans under the pressure. There is still real muscle beneath Lem’s flab. Rena watches from across the room, uncertain who she wants to win this struggle. But the outcome is never really in question. There is a scream and a sudden burst of scarlet as Lem’s blood slashes across the wall.