CHAPTER THIRTY

The silver bell rang, and again its glitter rained into the lower part of Sidrus’s dwelling.

But this time the bird was ignored, as was its message from Nebsuel saying that he had been wrong about these strange ones. He told Sidrus to come in peace and talk gently with them to find the answers he wanted. The bird pecked at its food tray, jumping from the perch into the cage. Again the bell chimed, and its sound melted to nothing in the quietness of the empty house.

Singing: Somewhere in the beige, vague world outside of his sleep, there was singing. His mouth was full of clay and dry holly leaves; he was aware of a dull throbbing and itching between himself and the melody. He tried to speak, and the itching turned to lines of glittering tinsel: shimmering pain. Ivy? No! Scarabs! Running under his skin! Encrusted and fast. Glass decorations. Christmas; a tree in a house?

He touched his face, expecting the soft contours of normality, but found only a huge, misshapen ball of rags where his head should have been. It had all gone wrong, but how? Think, remember. “Him’s,” she had called them, the endless dirges; him singing. Pine and wax smoking inside the room, where? The singing stopped.

“It is all well, master. You are well, and you are safe.”

The voice was close and without meaning. Something touched his lips; it was wet and cool, and he sucked hard on it. The knife! His throat cleared and his horror dispersed. The knife; he felt its pressure, and then it was gone. The knife to carve a feast, or him, or hymn. Hymns. Or a place in life and a socket of death.

“Tsungali,” he said feebly, touching his bandaged head again.

A larger hand closed over his and he felt its radiance and smelt pine again—the pine of disinfectant, not Christmas. As he slid back into a painless sleep, Tsungali continued to sing an ancient chant to keep the ghost bound tight in the body.

“Hold him,” ordered Nebsuel.

Ishmael was propped up on the bed, Tsungali’s rock-like good arm bound around him.

“The last layers of leaves and bandage might hurt when I take them off.” In the fetid darkness, Ishmael braced himself. The drugs had kept the pain at bay, but he knew that it was only sheltering, that it would emerge with vengeance when given half a moment. He was weary and mute; his body strained for experience, and his brain was exhausted through a lack of dreams. Now he could feel it all focusing in his itching face, sense it being rubbed awake under Nebsuel’s unwrapping.

Murky, stained light seeped in, and his hackles rose as the dressing tugged at the split nerves and sewn flesh. The final mass came away in one piece, letting the raw light play on his open wound. With the stained mass in his hands, Nebsuel silently studied his handiwork. He touched the new eyelids, and Ishmael yelped. It wasn’t pain, but a curdling flinch of nausea that made him jump.

“Hold still now,” said Nebsuel, nodding to Tsungali, who gripped the swaying patient more firmly.

After ten minutes of probing and squinting at his face, the medicine man smiled and said, “It is good, young master. Welcome to the mundane world of normal men.”

Ishmael wanted a mirror but was denied. “Not yet,” ordered the shaman. “You must wait for the swelling to go down. Your first impression is very important. It will stay in your mind forever; you must wait so that you will retain a good image, not a half-healed one.”

Ishmael saw the sense in this and decided to allow his good eye a few more days to be alone.

“I am leaving to fetch provisions, news, and wine,” announced Nebsuel. “My senses are tired and I need time away from the smell of your raw flesh. Look for me in a day or two, and do not look on or touch that face; let the air and sun mend it.”

Ishmael thought about threatening him over his return, but it seemed wrong, so he simply waved and said, “Be careful!” through the lower, working part of his face.

He settled back in the bed and allowed himself to imagine a new life, one without strangeness and hiding, a life full of lessons and couplings, of carnivals and friends. Unexpectedly, the Owl rose in his memory on silent and elegant wings, wings as white and pure as her silk bed linen; as powerful and soft as her hungry body and her lessons of kiss. He would see her again. She would not know him, but he would know her. He refused the pain-killing potion that Tsungali had been instructed to feed him. He had been dull for enough time. He wanted to focus on whom and what he knew, and who he was ready to become.

—

Tsungali was cooking in a small alcove behind a hanging carpet. He was still getting used to his new hand and forearm, and he muttered occasionally at its errors over the stove. The rich smell of simmering grain infused with thyme was settling across the room. Ishmael had found a book containing images of gardens, hand-coloured woodcuts printed on thick, crafted paper that itself still showed plant fibres crushed into its surface. He believed them to be fabled gardens from all over the world. He was looking at one from Tunisia, turning the book sideways to gaze at the interior depth, when he heard the door open.

“Nebsuel!” he called out. “I have taken one of your books to look at.”

The wrong kind of silence greeted his statement, the kind that made the house suddenly brittle. Tsungali sensed it, too, and quickly drew back the carpet screen.

“What is it?” said Ishmael. “Is there somebody here?”

Tsungali reached forward towards his weapons, then stopped, yanked upright, standing to attention. Ishmael nearly laughed but could not understand the expression on the grimacing face. They looked into each other’s eyes, both seeking some kind of solution, and then Ishmael saw it move: Midway down the old man’s body a small, silver fish twitched and shivered. It was growing in length, and Ishmael could not take his eyes from it. Tsungali, seeing his master’s stare, looked down at the point where the bright blade protruded from his chest. It turned and lengthened again, and he gave out a terrible cough as his heart was sliced through. He fell to his knees and landed facedown. The fish vanished.

Behind him, in the shadows, stood a man with a floating white melon head. His face looked like it had no bones beneath: a puffed-up bladder, smooth, immaculate, and totally unnatural. Had Nebsuel constructed this face? Is this what he would look like in a few days’ time?

Sidrus stepped over Tsungali’s body, keeping the long, razor-sharp blade held before him, never wavering from its aim at Ishmael’s neck.

“Don’t scream. Open your mouth and I will open your throat,” he said in a clear, foreign accent. “Answer my questions quietly. Where is Nebsuel? What have you done to him?”

“Done? We have done nothing; he is out buying wine.” Ishmael’s voice shook, but his new face held its defiant composure. The blade moved closer.

“Don’t lie to me, freak. Why would he trust you and this old dog, alone in his home?”

He kicked at Tsungali and the sound of his death throes rattled so loudly that his last words were obscured. Ishmael’s heart contracted in mortal fear of the cold-blooded killer, but he managed to scratch out an answer.

“He has been operating on both of us.”

This made no sense to Sidrus. Why would the healer bother with them after what they had done to the Bowman? And yet he could see the raw, stitched meat of this one’s face. He twisted Tsungali over with his foot and saw the strap that held his new arm. He nicked through it with the point of the blade and the hollow wood tumbled off. He put the flat of the blade against the stump and brought it up to his face. He sniffed at the fresh sutures and knew it to be true.

“Did you injure or kill the Bowman?” he asked.

“Do you mean Oneofthewilliams?”

“Yes,” said Sidrus, startled at the creature’s knowledge of that name.

“No. We left him in the Vorrh. He left without us.”

“And the bow?” Sidrus’s blade twitched.

“He…he gave it to me.”

Sidrus was dumbfounded; how could any of this be true? Why would Oneofthewilliams give the sacred thing to this meat-faced youth?

“I will have the truth!” he said, drawing another blade from concealment and advancing towards Ishmael’s shrinking bed, his small, cold eyes calculating where to cut first.

There was a sharp, metallic click from across the room, like somebody standing on a twig of iron. Sidrus knew what it was, even before he heard the voice.

“Twelve grams of splinter round at four metres,” it said. “Put the blades down where I can see them, old friend.”

Sidrus obeyed in slow motion, sneering at Ishmael.

“Nebsuel, I thought this scum had disposed of you.”

He started to turn towards the rifle’s muzzle, which peered at him from across the room.

“Very slowly, old friend. I know your ways and I am not alone.”

“But it was you who summoned me here,” said Sidrus.

“Yes, but I was wrong, and so were you to slay a man in my house.”

A rope was swiftly lowered from the ceiling, a loop tied at its end. “Put your hands in the noose,” said Nebsuel.

“There is no need for this; you can trust me. It will be better for you in the long term if you do.”

“Put your hands in the noose.”

“You tempt my anger,” snarled Sidrus.

“Put your hands in the noose! You are tempting your death, and you know I will do it.”

Sidrus thrust his hands into the looped rope; there was a small tug from above to tighten it and then a great wrench, which lifted him from the ground and high into the space above. A dry, rumbling sound filled the room with its mechanical power. It halted, and Nebsuel shouted up.

“You hang between two great wooden drums. If you displease me, you will be mangled through them and crushed to a rag before you can take a breath. Do you understand me?”

“I do!” came a faint voice.

“Now, tell me exactly what weapons and charms you have about your person.”

Sidrus began to recite an inventory of his possessions; Ishmael was astonished at the length of the list. When it was over, Nebsuel stepped out of the shadow; he held a black dove in his hand. He winked at Ishmael and threw it into the air.

The bird disappeared towards the sky, and he pulled a wooden lever concealed in the wall. The drums turned, slowly this time, and Sidrus was lowered to the ground. He was white from the strain of hanging by his twisted arms, dangling like a puppet. He glared at Nebsuel, who put a small ball of leaves in the wide muzzle of his short rifle and pushed it into Sidrus’s face.

“Eat it.”

“Fuck you!”

“Eat the sedative or eat the charge, and the splinters waiting behind it.” The hanging man knew Nebsuel would do it, so he sucked the sticky ball into his wide mouth. Nebsuel helped by jarring the rifle, chiselling the barrel onto Sidrus’s teeth.

“No man soils my house. No man murders in my healing room. Now swallow.”

He thrust the barrel again, hitting Sidrus in his Adam’s apple. Sidrus choked and swallowed the mouthful down, his eyes raging. The lever was pulled again and he fell to the ground. Nebsuel was at his side with a sharp, curved knife. He slit the rope from Sidrus’s hands with a deftness that demonstrated how easily he could have done the same to his throat.

“Put your weapons and charms on the table and go.” Nebsuel stood by the door, splinter gun at the ready.

“I could still take you both.”

“Maybe, but you would pay a terrible price for it. Anyway, we have the information you need to find your Bowman. Information that will now cost you dearly. You will never come here again. If you cross this threshold, you will die. In the future, we will communicate only by bird. Do you understand?”

“I want to know all, now!” Sidrus barked.

“I doubt you have the time.”

“I have all the time it takes,” he spat back.

“How long did it take you to get here?”

“What?”

“How long?”

“Three days.”

“As I thought. I have given you forty hours to get back.”

“What are you gibbering about, old fool?” snarled Sidrus.

“I told you, from now on we only communicate by bird. I sent a black dove to your abode, a quarter of an hour ago. It carries my last supply of the vital antidote for Mithrassia Toxia, the spore of which you sucked from my rifle a few minutes ago.”

“Mithrassia? You gave me Mithrassia?!”

“Yes. I lied about the sedative. That is why you don’t have the time to discuss what we may do for you.”

Sidrus was speechless for a moment and then bolted for the door.

“Pray there are no hawks in the skies between us,” shouted Nebsuel at the swinging door.

—

The healer started to clear up and remove the sad, scarred body of the old black warrior. Ishmael attempted to get off the bed to help but was stopped and told to rest.

Nebsuel disappeared outside to dispose of the body, then returned to the hushed interior to start to prepare for the cleansing ritual, which would last for five days. Ishmael watched him for many minutes before eventually asking, “Please, what is Mithrassia?”

The shaman groaned and sat down wearily on the edge of the bed, gently patting Ishmael’s hand. “Young man, you really don’t want to know; you have already been surrounded by too much shadow and chill. I will not be responsible for telling you more. You must heal now; you need to set your mind and body in light and warmth.” He started to get up, then turned, his face creaking into a reluctant grin. “Let me only say that the symptoms of Mithrassia are tenacious and unspeakable.”

Tsungali sat with his grandfather during the five days of purification. He did not know who had killed him, or why, only that it was not the healer; not like that. He hoped that Nebsuel would remember the oath he had taken, his vow to be more vengeful in his death than in his life. He hoped that the cleansing would stop short of his exorcism; part of himself needed to remain viable to be able to feast on the revenge; he needed his ghost in that world for a while longer, to protect Ishmael until he had reached his home. Need was the only thing that still remained, and he did not want the healer to rub it away; it would wear out in time; the spirit would depart—there might be the occasional, fleeting return, but his time was not without limits and he would have to make it count.

His grandfather was pleased to welcome him. He would have preferred him well and walking, back in that world, but this, though early, was always expected, and there was contentment in their reunion.

Nebsuel was as just as he was wise. He remembered Tsungali’s words, and in honour of his wishes, he did not make the final scouring. Instead, he shushed away the last, scattered remnant, sweeping his ghost out into the world, to wait with the dry leaves and dust until Ishmael was healed.

The day of the mirror arrived. Nebsuel showed Ishmael how to wash in the warm, pine-scented liquid in the bowl before him; he dried the new face with care and patted down the hair, which had grown long.

“Very well, young master,” said Nebsuel, fetching an oval mirror with a red cloth draped over it. “The time is here. Now you will see my handiwork and the way you will look in the world.” He set the looking glass before the young man, whose apprehension made his cheeks turn pale. With a small theatrical flourish, the healer removed the cover to reveal a blinking man, framed within.

Ishmael could not move or speak; he touched his nose and the inset eye, dabbing at its reality. As the silence grew, Nebsuel became nervous: If this was not to Ishmael’s taste or requirement, there was nothing he could do. It was impossible to read Ishmael’s expression; he had not yet become used to flexing it, and the inevitable nerve damage made parts of it permanently impassive. The shaman watched with growing trepidation. The cyclops still had the hideous bow close by; his displeasure might become horrendous with its use.

“What do you think?” ventured Nebsuel. “I have used all of my knowledge; it is the best of my work—of that you can be sure.”

The words nudged Ishmael. He stood up and very slowly approached Nebsuel. He took the old man’s hand and brought it to his lips. This was another kind of kiss, one that nobody had ever taught him.

—

The days passed quickly, with each better than the last. He gained strength and learned much from Nebsuel, who found it novel to have such a keen and sagacious student; he could show off his knowledge and tell tales of wonders and impossibilities all day without the young man’s attention ever failing.

The face became pliant as Ishmael practised with it. His moods could be read, and communication became more fluent. The bow lived in a corner of the house, wrapped and silent, recognised but unengaged.

Nothing had been heard of Sidrus. The dove did not return, so they could not know whether he was healthy and fuming with rage or if he had painfully rotted apart. As the weeks passed, they became less watchful; Nebsuel removed some of the more virulent charms that he had placed about the house for protection.

An unexpected friendship grew between the unlikely pair; for a time, they played at father and son. Tsungali occasionally came knocking at night, not to frighten them, but to announce his presence and register an anxiousness about the length of Ishmael’s stay. For a while they disregarded him and continued to work together in the ramshackle house. But growth and satisfaction can hold a young heart for only so long, and one morning, without apparent reason, Ishmael announced that it was time for him to leave and find his place in the world.

“What’s wrong with this being your place in the world?” grumbled Nebsuel.

“Nothing,” replied Ishmael, “but I have another one that I must confront first.”

“I suspect you’re right,” said the old man grudgingly.

They spent the coming days making preparations for his departure. Like the experience of all about to separate, the strain of an imagined elsewhere bore a hurtful torque on the moments they actually inhabited. The night before Ishmael’s departure, when they heard the impatient ghost moving back and forth outside, Nebsuel became bad-tempered and melancholic.

“Begone, you midnight nuisance. He will be yours tomorrow. Allow us a final evening together without your tramping.”

The words seemed to resonate with the spirit of Tsungali; they heard him change direction and walk away.

“Do ghosts ever sleep?” Ishmael found himself asking.

“Yes, but not the sleep of men; theirs is an emptier kind of slumber. Our sleep is always full: From catnap to coma, it brims over. Those hollow ones have thin, dangerous dreams.” There was a pause, as if the air might be listening. Then Nebsuel continued. “It is contagious to some; thin sleep can last for centuries. It can allow its owner to become modified or change themselves entirely. Some say that the creatures that infest the Vorrh use it knowingly for that purpose, that they bury themselves deeper and grow young, in their desire to return to nothing. It’s the only way they can ever escape the Vorrh and their charge at its centre.”

“If they lie buried and forgotten, how is this known?”

“Because some get dislodged, dug up by animals or men, dragged to the surface. These are the dangerous ones, because they no longer know what they are, and if they enter the world of men, they grow back deformed into its shape.”

“You mean that some of them walk with us out here?” Ishmael sounded at once fearful and defensive of his new world.

“It is said to be.” There was a pause while both men seemed to ponder the impossibility of such a thing.

“Do they breed with women?” said Ishmael.

Nebsuel laughed. “It is better and worse than that. Some mix the contagion of their sleeping with a knowing human, and fuse with humans inside its influence.”

“To what advantage?”

“If an Erstwhile and a willing human enter that condition and seal themselves away from the world, they become something else, something quite different, without form, like a memory, a tangible genie of the place where they hide. It can insist itself into the imagination of all those who pass by, stirring up great feelings and powerful emotions in the unsuspecting traveller. Some say that such a thing has been used in the defence of holy places. Jerusalem is said to be guarded that way, guarded by longing. It is even said that the spirit of the forest himself is composed of such an unmitigating force, that the Black Man of Many Faces is held together by it.”

These were big thoughts for Ishmael, whose head was already full of the melancholy of departure. He asked no more questions, and Nebsuel offered no further wisdom. They stared into the fire as it flickered in its raised iron grate in the middle of the room. They stared and sipped wine and said nothing.

The next morning they embraced in the doorway. Nebsuel had prepared a travelling bag full of potions and charms; it sat awkwardly in the doorframe between them. The bow was already outside, and the old man felt a lightness and relief at its departure. As they said their goodbyes, Nebsuel gave his warnings and advice, and Ishmael offered his deepest thanks. They vowed to meet again, and parted.