The Wraiths Of Will And Pleasure Part 22

'I will come with you,' Mima said.

Her brother put a hand upon her shoulder. 'No, Mima.' His voice was firm.

Ulaume led the way to his room high in the house rather than the sick room where Terez had spent the past days and that no doubt still stank of diseased flesh and rank despair. Terez sat down on the bed and Ulaume realised there was a certain acceptance within him. He knew what would happen and there was no question of resistance or reluctance. Perhaps, in the prison of his madness, he had thought only about this one thing all the time. He had been incepted after all.

The silence in the room was tangible and it poured from Terez like a black mist.

I will need wine for this, Ulaume thought. Ulaume thought.

'Excuse me a moment,' he said. 'I just have to fetch something.'

'Wait,' Terez said.

Ulaume paused with his hand on the door handle.

'Why?' Terez asked.

'Just to make us more relaxed.'

'No. Why did that bad thing happen to me? Why was I left behind here? I can remember almost everything but for the darkness when I went away from myself.'

Ulaume carefully s.h.i.+elded his thoughts, folding them in on themselves like petals. 'The Wraeththu who incepted you were marauders, rogues. They weren't organised. Something went wrong and they left without you. We're trying to make it right now.'

'It's too late,' Terez said.

Ulaume went back to the bed, sat beside him. 'No, it isn't. You are back. It'll take time, but you'll be fine. Mima is here.'

Terez shook his head. 'You are trying to make it right, but the light I should have had, with the one who was waiting for me, it is gone forever.'

Ulaume put an arm around Terez's shoulder and pulled his head down to his shoulder, which took some effort, because Terez didn't want to be comforted. Neither was Ulaume particularly adept at being a consoler. Eventually, however, Terez relented and relaxed against Ulaume's side. He exhaled long and slow: it was more than a sigh. 'There are many lights,' Ulaume said. 'You must believe it. I think your brother Pellaz is alive, even though everyhar thinks he's dead. Flick thinks we're all here for a reason and perhaps we are. If I can ease the pain, I will. It's all I can offer.'

'I should not be here,' Terez said. 'I should be with the one who was waiting for me.'

Ulaume had expected many responses: anger, confusion, resentment, fear and hatred. But not this. He realised now that Terez had been a willing convert to Wraeththu, perhaps having thought about it for a long time after Pell had left with Cal. Had Mima known this? Was this why she had dragged him away from those who'd incepted him? The situation was far more complicated than Ulaume had thought, and it was not the kind of thing he enjoyed dealing with. If anything, it was Flick's territory.

'It has to be you,' Terez said abruptly. 'Not the other one. You. It is my choice.'

'Don't do that,' Ulaume said. 'Don't listen in. That's one of the first rules.'

'I've been listening for a long time,' Terez said. 'I have heard many things and soon I will know what they mean.' He glanced at Ulaume. 'You wish you had not done this thing, and you wish you could walk away now. If you were meant to do this, you don't want to, but you care about what the others think. You care what Pellaz thinks, because he thinks badly of you.'

Ulaume stood up. 'That's enough.'

'I know what you all wanted,' Terez said in a chilling monotone. 'I would be mad and you would play with me, like you play with a sick animal. You would lead me from room to room and feed me and comfort me. You did not want me to be what I am. I was never mad, Ulaume, just lost. I forgot how to live in this vehicle of flesh, but I will remember. It survived without me for a time, and now it needs my attention because it has not cared for itself.'

'Where were you?' Ulaume asked.

'In this world, there are no words to describe it, although of all of them here, you would be the most likely to understand it. It is why you are here now, but don't be afraid. I won't take you back there.'

'I could walk from this room,' Ulaume said. 'I have no obligation to you. If I did, would you go back to that dark place?'

'I will not go back,' Terez said. 'You will give me what I need.' His eyes grew wider and they were completely black. 'Look at me. There are things in me you desire. I slept beside Pellaz every night of my life, from the moment I left my mother's breast until he went away. You want to see through my eyes, hear my stories of the past. Give me your essence, Ulaume, and this flesh will look more how you want it to look. I am happy to indulge your fantasies.'

Ulaume had unconsciously moved back until he was pressed against the door. The creature before him now was more horrific than the thing he'd stumbled across in the Cevarro house. It was intelligent and powerful and determined. It was like a dark Pellaz, not evil certainly, but possessed of knowledge that Pell had never had.

'You are rarely afraid,' Terez said, unwinding his long body from the bed like a black cobra. He could move quickly, and in that too he was like a snake. In an instant, his hands were on Ulaume's face, powerful head-splintering energy pouring from his fingers. His skin smelled like bitter chocolate. 'Listen,' Terez said.

He put his mouth against Ulaume's own, and Ulaume tensed himself for some kind of terrible fight, but Terez poured into him a series of images from the past. He could smell the cable as the seed pods burst in the fields. He could hear Pell's laughter as he ran towards the sunset. Thunderclouds swept over the cordillera and white tailed deer fled before a storm. Pellaz crouched before him, surrounded by blue stem gra.s.s and the spikes of agave. His loose s.h.i.+rt was very white in the strange storm-light and his hair very black. His eyes were full of humour. There was no guard there, no caution or judgement. This was the Pellaz of whom Ulaume had once dreamed. Pellaz said, 'I think, if we try hard enough, we could change the weather.'

Terez broke away and Ulaume put his hands against his eyes. He wanted to pull Terez back to him, because the vision had been so real.

'You would do anything to see him again,' Terez said, 'and you know I can help you. First, you must help me.'

Ulaume had met few hara he considered stronger than himself. In Terez, he feared he might have met his match. The Cevarros were clearly a singular breed and their inception to Wraeththu could mean more to harakind than any could have envisaged for good or ill. Somewhere, another one could still be running around with a rogue band of hara. It was anyhar's guess how Dorado might have developed, but Ulaume doubted he was a faceless rank and file har of low caste.

For two days, Terez kept Ulaume in the high attic room, and it was not as if Ulaume wanted to leave particularly. Something inside him was faintly repulsed by the dark force that surrounded him and took possession of him, but it was also intriguing and in some ways addictive. It reminded Ulaume of his best days with Lianvis, when they had explored higher realms together, lost in the delirious waves of focused aruna. Terez was careful not to deplete Ulaume, because he clearly did not want to damage the thing that could replenish him. He seemed to be knowledgeable and skilled in the arts of aruna, which should be impossible, because he couldn't have been trained prior to inception. It occurred to Ulaume that Terez might have received otherworldly instruction or else he acted upon instinct. What was certain was that Terez was hungry for energy and power. And he was cunning, because he knew that in pleasing Ulaume, he got what he wanted. Part of the contract between them was information.

Ulaume heard about how Terez and Pellaz grew up together, Terez being a year younger than his brother, while Dorado was a couple of years older than Pell. Pellaz had not known it, but Terez had been awake for most of the night while Cal had conducted his big seduction. He had heard some of what had been said, even though Pell and Cal had talked, for the most part, in whispers.

'I fell asleep, and dreamed I left home with them,' he said, 'but when I awoke, it was too late, because they were gone. For a long time, I hated Pell for that, even as I mourned his loss. But I knew I only had to wait, and I was right, because eventually the... others came.'

'Who killed your family,' Ulaume said. 'Didn't you feel anything about that?'

'They were no longer my family,' Terez answered. 'I could not allow myself to feel pain. I had to endure whatever it took and be strong enough to do so. I had to follow Pell.'

As perhaps, Ulaume thought, he had always done.

'Do you you ever think of your human family?' Terez asked. ever think of your human family?' Terez asked.

'No,' Ulaume said, and it was true.

'Then don't expect me to,' Terez said.

'But Mima is here. She is... well, we're not really sure what she is, but she's not quite human any more.'

'She and Pell were very close,' Terez said. 'She was never like the other girls. If she has found a way to survive in this new world, then I respect her for it.'

'There are some tribes,' Ulaume said, 'that... even within Wraeththu have a bad reputation. There is a darkness to you, Terez. I'm sure you know that. Could it have come from your inception? Who were the hara that incepted you? Can you remember anything about them?'

Terez glanced at Ulaume keenly. 'I was with them for such a short time, but one of them, he taught me many things. He told me about Kakkahaar, your tribe, and some of the others. He told me who were his enemies and who were not.'

'Are Kakkahaar enemies of his?'

'They are not to be trusted.'

Terez had spent a week with the hara who'd ransacked his home, and at the end of this time, one of them had incepted him. Althaia had caused him to lose track of what happened next. Mercifully, he could not remember that it had been Mima who'd dragged him away from his newfound family.

Flick or Mima brought trays of food to the room and left them outside the door, which Ulaume regularly collected. On the evening of the second day, he took all the sc.r.a.ps and plates downstairs and found all his companions in the kitchen, who went silent when he walked in.

Then Flick said, 'We were just debating whether to break down the door to your room. We wondered what had happened to you.'

'Still alive,' Ulaume said. He glanced behind him, closed the door by leaning on it, then went to the table and put down the trays. 'Listen, I must speak quickly. Mima, all of you, guard your thoughts. Guard them well, at every moment. Terez is something more than we all imagined.'

'What do you mean?' Mima hissed.

'Don't let him know what you did, Mima. Never!' Ulaume said. 'He would hate you for it. He wanted to be Wraeththu and he is angry at what was taken from him.'

Mima turned away. Lileem only stared up at Ulaume, her face white, her eyes wide.

'What are you trying to tell us?' Flick asked.

'I don't know,' Ulaume said. 'Just that we've got more on our hands than we bargained for. Terez is no addled, wandering soul. He's back with a vengeance.'

'He will never be like you,' Lileem said, in a small voice. 'I told you that.'

'You didn't listen to me, did you,' Ulaume said to Flick. 'I cautioned against this. Now, we must cope with the consequences.'

And the consequences made themselves known swiftly. Terez appeared shortly after Ulaume had come downstairs. He had taken a bath and dressed himself in some clothes that Ulaume had found for him. Flick uttered some awkward remarks about making dinner, but Terez ignored him. He spoke directly to Mima. 'We will leave tomorrow,' he said.

Mima looked fl.u.s.tered, which was not a usual state for her. 'What do you mean?'

'I am going to seek my brothers. I acknowledge that, because you have been changed, you should fall under my protection. You will come with me.'

'No,' Mima said. 'I don't want to do that.'

'That is your choice,' Terez said, 'but I think it is what Pell would have wanted.'

'He's dead,' Mima said. 'We have no real proof otherwise.'

'You have no idea what death is,' Terez said. 'We will find him.'

'How?' Mima said. 'It's a big world out there. Dorado could be dead too, for all we know. Stay here a while, heal yourself. Then think about the future.'

While Mima was speaking, Ulaume silently begged her to let Terez go. Nothing but trouble would come of him remaining among them. They had done their job in bringing back his mind, now they should let him do what he wanted. But Mima blocked out his call. She was obsessed, full of guilt.

'This place is not fit to live in,' Terez said. 'It should be allowed to return to dust. It is wrong what you are doing here. If you want to survive, you must learn to become har, and you won't do that here.'

'What if I can't become har?' Mima snapped. 'What if I'm safer here, where hara don't want to kill me?'

'Nowhere is safe,' Terez said, 'not without a tribe. I learned this before I was taken into darkness.'

'Then go!' Mima cried, then shook her head, raking her hands through her hair. 'But not yet. Please. You are the only one left. Stay here a while with me. Help me become har, if that's what I should do.'

Ulaume exchanged a glance with Flick, who stood mortified by the sink. Neither of them knew how to defuse this situation. They had brought something into the house and it was not what they'd thought it was.

Flick went out into the garden and Ulaume followed him. Now, there was a reticence between them, as if their night of bliss had never been.

'I'm sorry about this,' Ulaume said. He wanted to take Flick in his arms, but sensed Flick didn't want it. No doubt he was repulsed by the aura of Terez's essence, which must be hanging around Ulaume in a foul cloud.

'It's all right,' Flick said, bending down to pluck out some weeds from the flower beds. 'I know what you have to do.'

'He just needs strength,' Ulaume said.

'I know. It was me who suggested it. I'm OK, really.'

'Flick.'

Flick sighed and stood up. He turned to face Ulaume and his expression was resigned. 'We had a job to do. We did it. We had fun doing it. Now, you have another job to do.'

The coldness in his tone made Ulaume's heart freeze. 'Fine,' he said and went back into the house.

He did not see Flick crouch down again and put his hands against his face.

One of the first things Terez did was to go down among the dwellings below the hill and set fire to them. Flick was furious about this pointless waste, and realised that he was watching his dreams of a new Saltrock go up in smoke. He watched Terez from the hill, a tall dark figure against the flames. The flames were his anger, his bitterness. He would purge the landscape where he had lived as an animal for so long.

Terez slept with Ulaume every night, because he needed aruna to make him strong. It was clear that Ulaume had ambivalent feelings about this, although he did not speak to Flick about it. Flick realised he had succeeded in freezing Ulaume off, which was not what he had intended. Mima told Flick that Ulaume had confessed to her he was drawn to Terez's dark force, and also that he wanted to hear as much as he could about Pellaz's childhood. Wraeththu were supposed to cast off the past, but perhaps in Pell's history lay the secret of why he was so different to other hara. So far, no useful information had been forthcoming. Pell had not been born in a thunderstorm or a hurricane. He had not appeared psychic as a boy. He had not had prophetic dreams. It was obvious he had been enchanting and the most favoured son in the family, but Ulaume hoped to find something deeper than this. If Terez knew more than Mima did about their brother, he was keeping the information private.

Flick felt resentful of the way Terez commanded Ulaume's attention. He had opened himself up to aruna again only for it to be denied him. There were no illusions that he had fallen in love with Ulaume: Flick knew the feelings he had were entirely physical. He knew that Ulaume was aware of how he felt and probably would have been happy to share his time with Flick, but Flick couldn't bear the thought of being intimate with a har who was intimate with Terez. He also thought that Ulaume was scared of Terez, and that was mainly why he took aruna with him so often, but Ulaume would never admit that, even to himself. Terez was was frightening. He was an implacable force that was entirely self-serving. He was not really har, because half of him was missing: the feeling half. But, as each day pa.s.sed, Terez grew more physically attractive. One day, he would be devastating, and Flick imagined that the only har who might be able to contain him then was Cal. Terez had a disturbing gaze, not because it was empty, but because it was so full of things Flick could not understand or interpret. Sometimes, it felt as if Terez might leap up, kill and devour him. Terez despised them all, including Mima. The closeness they'd experienced at the falls had been ephemeral. Flick wondered whether Terez suspected the truth about his sister. If so, she might be in danger. frightening. He was an implacable force that was entirely self-serving. He was not really har, because half of him was missing: the feeling half. But, as each day pa.s.sed, Terez grew more physically attractive. One day, he would be devastating, and Flick imagined that the only har who might be able to contain him then was Cal. Terez had a disturbing gaze, not because it was empty, but because it was so full of things Flick could not understand or interpret. Sometimes, it felt as if Terez might leap up, kill and devour him. Terez despised them all, including Mima. The closeness they'd experienced at the falls had been ephemeral. Flick wondered whether Terez suspected the truth about his sister. If so, she might be in danger.

After a month or so had pa.s.sed, it was clear to Flick that Mima's tolerance of Terez's strange behaviour was wearing thin. She wanted to love him and be loved by him, but he barely acknowledged her existence. He didn't remain at the white house because of her, but for some other reason, about which Flick could only conjecture. Flick was sure Terez didn't regard either Mima or Lileem as abominations to be expunged; he simply wasn't interested in them at all. Mima's eyes became haunted and sad. Therefore, when the household woke up one morning to find Terez gone, along with Flick's pony, none of them were really sorry. Flick was angry and saddened to lose Ghost, but perhaps the sacrifice was worth it, if it meant Terez was no longer around. They had performed their incautious charitable act, borne the unforeseen consequences, and now it was time to move on.

That night, Ulaume came to Flick's room and Flick said nothing. He merely opened up the covers and allowed Ulaume to climb in beside him. There was no point in condemning Ulaume for his absence. He was his own creature, perhaps more like Terez than he was like Flick. They shared breath, and Flick pulled away, because he could taste something dark and sour.

'Make it go away,' Ulaume said. 'Please. You are stronger.'

So Flick poured his heart and soul into Ulaume's being, a fierce radiance to cast out the shadows. As ouana, he had the power to command the darkness to depart.

Lying in Flick's arms, Ulaume asked, 'What have we learned from all this, Flick?'

'That we shouldn't expect grat.i.tude,' Flick replied. 'I was an idiot, and you were right. We should have put a pillow over his head months ago.'

The Cevarro house had burned to the ground, and all the ghosts in the settlement had fled. Tonight, the breeze that came in through the window smelled of charred wood. 'Perhaps we should move on now,' Ulaume said. 'Find somewhere else to live.'

'He won't come back,' Flick said. 'Don't worry about it.'

'It's not just that. I don't feel safe here now and it's nothing to do with Terez.' Ulaume turned his head to the side and the fact that he was anxious kindled a similar feeling in Flick's heart.

Long after Ulaume had gone to sleep, Flick sat by the window, staring out over the dark landscape. Just before dawn, he saw the serpent of lights.

Chapter Seventeen.

Flick shook Ulaume awake, pointed wordlessly at the window, then hurried to Mima and Lileem's room to wake them too.