Web of Sand

Chapter Six

Tariq lived high in the Khain Tower, his private apartment fitted with windows, a covered walk, a place from which to look at the distant hills but lower, where he held his select gatherings, there were no windows. Instead, to make the affair a success, there were drifting globes which burst to emit puffs of colored smoke, others which gave birth to acrid scents, subtle perfumes, noxious odors. Shimmering membranes snowed the air each singing with whispers, murmurings, sonorous chords, lewd suggestions, jokes, ribaldries.

Hie wine was touched with rainbows, the food a plethora of shape and form; miniature ships, cities, castles, naked men and women, obscene monsters, beasts, things from the nightmare of imagination all resting on salvers decorated with slowly moving fringes of pseudo-life. Jellies shook and pulsed to subsonic rhythms and strobes froze hectic movement in transitory chiaroscuros. There was an acrobat, a dancer, a man who performed illusions. A mutant with a twin growing from his side. A man who wrung magic from a guitar. An old woman with a singing jewel.

There was no time in Harge. Only a window could tell the passing of day and night; the rest was a constant glow dulled only by intent. Life progressed at a steady pace, hours rolling one into the other, natural divisions blurred into a matter of convenience. But Marta Caine had her own biological clock and she was tired.

It was an ache which seemed to have penetrated her very bones so that she sat, back against the wall, the box holding the jewel cradled in her lap. Beyond the wall of the small room the party throbbed with undiminished energy, a sound which grew louder, to fade as the door was closed.

"Marta?" Kemmer was standing before her, a frosted glass of wine in one hand, a plate of dainties in the other.

"Marta?" He smiled as she opened her eyes. "Here, drink this wine and have a bite of food. It will help restore your strength." His smile masked concern. "Come now. They may call for you soon."

Never would be soon enough the way she was feeling but she made an effort, tasting a little of the food, gulping the wine. Santis reached his hand on her own as she made to set down the plate.

"Eat. Maurice, some more wine?" As the trader left he said, with unexpected insight. "The jewel?"

"Yes." The lid of the box lifted beneath her hand. "It gives," she murmured. "But also it takes." The dull surface was smooth to her touch. "Its beauty needs to be fed."

With more than the ultraviolet light supplied by the lamp she had bought; the chemical sprays with which she moistened its facets. Each time it sang it robbed her of a little more of her strength; giving and taking even as it gave. A symbiote needing the proximity of her humanity and taking nervous energy in return for the mood it created.

"You've been working too hard," said the mercenary. "Too many performances too soon. After this you rest for a few days. I'll have a word with Dell Chuba when I collect the fee." He forced lightness into his tone. "Now eat up, my dear. It all helps."

Sustenance which was as good as money and she forced herself to eat the spiced and pungent morsels. The plate was almost empty when Kemmer returned bearing a full decanter.

"This should last us," he said. "The best-they can afford it. I thought we might as well take the opportunity while it was going. I guess we won't be kept waiting much longer."

"How is it out there?"

"As you'd expect." He smiled at her as he refilled her glass. "Noise, talking, dancing-how else do the rich enjoy themselves?" Casually he added, "I saw Earl while I was getting the wine."

Santis said, "Alone?"

"No. With the red-haired woman who shouted to him in the arena. She's got money from the look of her. Maybe Earl's trying to get back some of that five thousand her escort took off us when he went down."

"Or maybe he's just making the most of an opportunity."

"That could be it," agreed the trader. "Making contacts, finding out who can do what-that's half the battle. More than half if the truth be told. And advertising covers the rest. Once known, get yourself talked about. Make yourself appear to be important. People always want what they think is rare or valuable."

Marta Cable said, thoughtfully, "Earl needs to be careful. If that woman has a wealthy lover he could turn awkward. It would be simple for him to hire an assassin."

"A risk," admitted the mercenary. "But life is full of risks and no man can avoid them all."

Least of all himself, she thought as, sipping the wine, she watched him drink from the decanter. Like herself he was old and must also be tired but if he was, no sign showed on the seamed face or in the hooded eyes. But his weariness would be the natural result of physical strain while hers came from a deeper source. How long, she wondered, until she had nothing left to give? Would the jewel then fail to respond? And, if it did, what then?

She knew the answer yet hated even to consider it. To pass the jewel on to another; to lease it out. To provide it with a young a vibrant counterpart. Yet the jewel was hers, a part of her life, a thing too personal to be handed on like an old shoe. And what if it preferred the new stimulus and failed to respond ever again to herself?

A worrying thought and she pushed it away from her as she had always managed to push away troublesome things-a trick she had learned long ago when to brood over misfortune would have been to invite insanity. One taught her by an old harlot willing to teach a younger colleague how to survive the black and evil emotions haunting the profession.

To think, when depressed, of bright things; the fees which were mounting and the security they represented. Of the safety provided by the guards. Dumarest had been right and she had to admit it.

What was he doing here? Scheming, planning, waiting for opportunities? The presence of the woman was obvious and she felt a momentary envy of the embrace she had known or would experience. Once she too had felt the ecstasy to be found within a man's arms. Which she could feel again if only the right man would make himself known. Someone like Corcyra or Dumarest-odd how they both shared so many of the same characteristics.

"Marta!" She started as Santis touched her shoulder, conscious that she had dozed. "You'd better check your appearance," he advised. "You could be summoned any moment."

Alejandro Jwani was slimly built, of medium height, his head peaked, balding, the ears highly convoluted. His hands were small, delicate, the nails blunt and polished. His clothes were touched with vivid colors at wrist and throat; flashes of scarlet and lemon showing bright against a dull purple. Ellain's friend and if he knew anything of Earth he was reluctant to admit it.

"A name," he said. "One which intrigued me a little. Would you care to try one of these exotic delights?"

Dumarest looked at the tray held before him, selected a harmless seeming cone topped with a violet crystal, bit into it and tasted vileness.

"You lost," said Jwani handing him wine. "I could tell it from the way you puckered your mouth."

The wine helped but the taste still lingered. Ellain, smiling, offered him a triangle coated with sparkling dust.

"Here, Earl, this is sweet, I promise. Unless, of course, Tariq has changed the culinary pattern since his last assembly."

He hadn't, the morsel was sweet and eliminated the lingering foulness of the cone. Dumarest said, "Ellain mentioned you were a hunter, Alejandro. On Harge?"

"You are wondering what there could be on this world to hunt, Earl. Am I right? And yet do not be misled by a word. To hunt-what does it mean? To look for, to search, to engage on a quest, to seek-how meaning can change. This dish now." Jwani lifted the plate. "Each morsel is a gamble and to find one which is palatable is surely to hunt for sweetness?"

"Or to hunt for vileness."

"True and again you demonstrate how meaning can alter. All words are but labels and each can be read in more than one way. Good, bad-good as compared to what? Bad as compared to what? And, if there is no good, can there be anything which is bad? Anything which is evil? You recognize the problem, my friend?"

The man was more than a little drunk despite his apparent sobriety. Any meaningful communication would have to wait. Dumarest took the plate from Jwani's hands and set it on the table. Stimulated by the disturbance of air, the warmth of his flesh, tendrils of pseudo-life lifted to wave like blind and seeking worms.

"I have offended you," said Jwani. "You are offended."

"There can be no offense where there is no intention to offend." Dumarest reached for a decanter and poured a stream of scintillant wine into a goblet shaped and colored like a rose. "I merely freed your hands so as to give you this." He placed the goblet into the empty hands. "So as to offer you a toast with this." He lifted his own glass. "I drink to your health!"

"Good or bad?"

"Good, naturally. Are you my enemy?"

Jwain said, dryly, "From what I've heard of you, Earl, it wouldn't be healthy to be that. Rest assured I am your friend."

"And friends should meet. Tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow. Later, certainly. Ellain knows where I am to be found. And now-" He swayed a little, his face turning suddenly black. "And now I think I need a… a little…"

Dumarest caught him as he fell. Attendants, answering Ellain's signal, came rushing to relieve him of the burden. As he made to follow them from the room she caught his arm.

"No, Earl!"

"He needs help and-"

"But not from you. Understand me, Earl, it's a matter or pride. The servants don't matter but if he knew you had seen him ill, vomiting, at his worst, he would never want to face you again. He would even take your presence as a deliberate insult. Believe me."

She had no reason to lie and it sounded reasonable. Certainly he had run into stranger mores but it was a chance lost. Few men when in need would be reluctant to accept help and, when drunk, a man often could be influenced to tell more than he intended.

Ellain said, "I'm sorry, Earl. If Alejandro has a fault it's that he can't hold his liquor. He also doesn't know when to stop. Usually he just becomes a bore but tonight he outdid himself. Still, it gives you an advantage."

"How?"

"He doesn't usually remember just what he's said toward the last." She looked at him without expression. "Shall we dance?"

He led her to the center of the floor, her scarlet hair cascading over an emerald gown, her waist caught with a cincture of gold, more gold hugging her naked, high-arched feet Dumarest had little interest in the dance but the needs of the arena had made him light on his feet and the beat of the music was easy to follow. Ellain matched his movements, accentuating them, adding more of her own so that she spun like a tinted river against the gray of stone. A display overpraised by a sharp-eyed woman with a painted face and nails which would have suited a feline.

"My dear, you were superb! It's such a comfort to your friends to discover you can do more than sing. I was distraught when I learned you were not to entertain us-but there are consolations."

"Of course, Weenedia. That of attending as a guest for one. I no longer have to pretend to be amused by ignorance."

The woman ignored the insult. Her voice was acid. "A new friend, I see?" Her eyes glanced toward Dumarest. "I wondered what had happened to Yunus, then I remembered he was engaged with the Barroccas on a matter of cost adjustment. Have you met Ieko Barrocca? A sweet and fantastically lovely young woman. I'm sure they will be very happy. Ah! I see young Tariq over there. I think he is about to entertain us with his new novelty."

"Bitch!" Ellain stared after the woman as she hurried away. "Trust her to turn the knife!" And trust her to tell Yunus of the dance and of Dumarest. Well, to hell with him. For tonight at least. If he was with the Barroccas he wouldn't be bothering her. And the dance had made her acutely aware of her body. "Earl, I'm bored. Take me away from here."

"Now?"

"Why not? Alejandro has left and we've done what we came for. We could walk in the gardens or visit the gymnasium. See some baiting or try a sensatape. Or we could just go back home." Her eyes told him which she preferred. "There'll be no need to hurry now. We can talk and make plans. Earl?"

Before he could answer the air trembled to the clash of a gong and, with suitable solemnity, Tariq Khalil presented the singing jewel.

Marta Caine had changed, Dumarest could tell it at once as, dressed in a long, flowing gown of sequined black, she walked from the side room out into the center of the floor. Carl and Maurice attended her, both wearing robes, the trader bearing the now-decorated box, the mercenary watchful, as always on guard against a sudden rush, a snatch, a threat to the jewel or its owner.

"This is nonsense!" Ellain didn't trouble to lower her voice. "Stupid theatricallity. What the hell's she supposed to be? A priestess of some kind?"

Dumarest said harshly, "She is a woman trying to earn a living. Respect that if nothing else."

"But-"

"Damn you! Shut up and give her a chance!"

She fell silent, shaken by his fury, wondering at his concern for a stupid old woman who walked with hands lifted in supplication as if she were praying. A woman both old and ugly; the ebon veil covering her hair framed a living skull.

Time, she thought, it brings this to us all. Age, the insidious poison which robs flesh of its firmness, muscle and tissue of resiliency. She remembered what she had seen in her mirror and felt a sudden revulsion. No! Better to die than to linger to look like the poor creature now standing, hands extended for the box which the robed figure extended toward her. The box she touched and the lid she slowly lifted while, from the musicians, came the solemn beat of a muffled drum.

Theatrical buffoonery-but effective. Even she felt the growing tension. The intangible feel of something stupendous and terrifying about to happen-a tension which mounted as the aged hands dipped into the box to lift, cupped, to poise while the fingers slowly opened to reveal what they contained.

"Glass!" She whispered her disappointment. "By God, it's just glass!"

"No." Dumarest answered her. "Not glass. Now be silent and watch what happens."

The drumbeat continued, fading, dying as if retreating to make way for something new and marvelous; becoming a stirring whisper as, its heraldry accomplished, it stole quietly from the scene.

To leave silence.

A silence which lengthened until the ears seemed to ache with waiting and then, slowly, so slowly, the jewel began to brighten, to illuminate the skeletal fingers caressing it, the skeletal face behind it. A face which tilted as the hands lifted the jewel. One which became transfigured as the gem began to sing.

And, in the song, was death.

A dirge which keened the end of all life, all sunsets, all dawns. A thin, whining threnody which told of the chill and empty places between the stars, of ice, of deserts, of hopeless emptiness. Of the slow and inevitable halting of growth and the termination of desire.

Depression came to kill the party. A cloud of endless night which froze the smiles of anticipation and converted jovial congress into the strained facade of a wake. In imagination faces became skulls and fleshless jaws gaped in grimaces which were the mockery of smiles.

"No!" Ellain felt the constriction of her stomach, her heart. "Dear God, no!"

The Interlude had never been like this. Ecuilton's despair had never touched such depths. Even Schiller in the madness which had created the Tubero had failed to induce such hopeless resignation. She felt smothered by it. Condemned and yet accepting the condemnation. Dying and resigned to death. Seeing the approaching termination of her entire existence and, singing, accepting it. Dying as she sang. Singing as she died.

No, not her-it!

The thing cradled in the thin, bony fingers. Or was it the fingers which sang and the glowing jewel only amplified? Or the woman whose hands they were? Or the brain behind the skull-like face? Or the mind within the brain? The soul? The intangible something which could never be seen, touched, measured, felt. The ego. The individual.

Not her-it!

An enemy, robbing her of life, of hope, of love. Taking all she held of value. A thing of crystal, glowing, singing, singing-and if she could do nothing else she too could sing.

Sing as the jewel sang, her voice rising, keening, the tone modulated to near-perfection, stomach and lungs, throat and larynx, mouth and teeth and lips and tongue all amplifying and directing and harmonizing the throbbing of the column of air she had created.

The note.

The rising, singing, vibrating note which rose to shrill, to merge with the song of the jewel, to blend with it, to resonate with it, to find the key, the harmonic of the stone itself.

Unseen, unheard, glass shattered on the tables and a woman screamed as she clutched her ears. A scream repeated as another fell, followed by a youth, a man, another girl. Dumarest felt the pain stab his eardrums and lifted his hands, palms cupped to give protection. Muffled as it was, the sound still penetrated and he saw Malta's face, the blood seeping from her nostrils, the lobes of her ears.

And still Ellain, mouth wide, throat corded with effort, sent the magic of her voice to challenge that of the jewel.

She had broken glass as a girl, won bets on her ability to do so, even ruined a crystal chandelier in the auditorium on Weem-an accident and one never repeated but she still had the power. And now, more than ever before, she used it. Seeking, altering her tone a fraction at a time, the harmonics, building resonance until the blood thundered in her veins and she felt the capillaries begin to yield in throat and mouth, in lips and tongue. Singing, aping the jewel, mastering it.

Killing it.

And killing Marta Caine.

Dumarest saw her stagger as the jewel exploded in her hands. A puff of brilliance which accompanied a sudden, crystalline, shatter. A rain of fragments fell from the opening fingers, the falling hands. A glittering rain which sprayed to a widening shower as the thin body wafted the air in its fall.

"Marta!" Santis was at her side, cradling her sagging head as he expertly checked for signs of life. As Dumarest knelt at his side he said, "She's gone, Earl. Dead."

"Dead?" Kemmer looked stunned. "But how? Who did it? That woman?" He glared at Ellain where she stood, face buried in her arms. "That red-haired bitch? Was she responsible?"

"Steady!" Dumarest reached out and touched the thin face. Glitter stained his fingers as he lifted them from the flaccid skin. "Her heart went or her nerves gave out or something yielded in her brain. How did she get so thin? Wasn't she eating?"

"The jewel, Earl." Santis closed the staring eyes. "It sucked her life."

"Didn't she know? Didn't she care?" Dumarest remembered the casino. "The fool. I tried to help her. There was no need for this."

"Perhaps she'd given up." Gently the mercenary rested her head on the glittering floor. A rasp of his hand and shards of the broken jewel rested against her cheek. "I've been watching her. Half the time she only pretended to eat and when you're old you lose energy fast. She was older than we guessed. And, maybe, she was happy to go."

To die with her jewel: the toy which had graced her life. To end in song and a bright, wonderful, glittering rain. She could have done a lot worse.