Elizabeth Hand - Winterlong

“Sweet Magdalene,” I breathed.

For thus had each Ascension been heralded, by new moons appearing in the heavens to flame and burst like mafic-lights. And suddenly I heard from every point of the City distant cries and clamor. From very far off came the screams of sirens, the thrumming of fougas, and faintest of all the boom of congreves being launched across the river.

I turned, stumbling against the jackal. It grabbed my trouser leg with its teeth and tugged insistently. By now I had no doubts but that I had somehow fallen into an adventure such as Doctor Foster had so often recited to us. As easily as a serpent shedding its skin I sloughed off any reservations I might have had a day earlier about following a ghostly animal through a forest where gods walked and the flowers thirsted for the blood of men.

“Where you will, Anku!” I said. That had been the name of Miramar’s tame dog. This one fairly danced upon hearing it, tossing its head back and letting forth once again that weird wailing song. Then it darted into the woods, its white flanks gleaming through the tangled brush. I followed, steeling my heart against the echo of distant sirens and airships. I ran with wild delight, daring them to hunt me who ran with Death’s dog.

THROUGH THE WOODS WE plunged. It seemed to me that days had fled since first I entered that place, but the moon had scarcely crept across the sky. It was still early evening. With Anku racing ahead of me I ran, head held low to keep him in my sight. The trees seemed to shrink from our passage. Beneath my feet mandragons puled as I crushed them in spurts of white froth. Neither these nor the cries of the betulamia, slender trees like birches that reached to embrace me, could frighten or impede me now. Somewhere ahead of us the river slumbered and the Houses of Eros guttered with golden light. Somewhere Roland embraced another pathic and coursed the first slow steps of the pavane that began each Paphian masque.

At the thought I clenched my teeth. A new kind of lust stirred me: a sudden fierce need for pain and harrowing, a raging desire to wrench the veil of flesh and tendon from Roland’s face and slake this fever with his blood. About my wrist the sagittal burned with a pulsing violet light. I laughed and raised my fist so that it lit the path before me. Anku turned, his white teeth glittering.

The trees thinned to a copse pricked with flashing fireflies. Anku bounded through the tall grass. I hesitated, blinking in the brighter moonlight that spilled onto the coppice. A few yards ahead the shallow reflections of stars glimmered across the Tiger Creek. I whooped in delight and raced across the field to splash in the shallow water. Already Anku waded there, drinking and shaking his muzzle. I sloshed to where the water flowed knee-high, gazing upstream to see if I could locate the Hill Magdalena Ardent hidden behind the dense foliage. And yes, if I squinted I could just make out the more refined silhouettes of ruins and even a pale glimmering that was surely the lights of High Brazil.

At that sight my heart leaped with an overwhelming desire to see my people: Miramar and Ketura, Small Thomas and Benedick, even old Doctor Foster.

And Fancy. Most of all, little Fancy, who danced through all my dreams and alone remained a kind of light to me when I was most desperate. Even now, when about me reared the black spires of the Narrow Forest and lazars hooted in the distance, the thought of Fancy, somewhere, (missing me perhaps?) waking from her evening nap to dress for the ball calmed me as nothing else ever could. All the madness that had befallen me could be kept at bay by the knowledge that she sang and slept and danced there upon the Paphian’s hill; as if I was like the princess in the story, who could not be killed by fire or sword or swivel because her heart was hidden safely elsewhere. The bitter longing that had hurried me through the woods melted into a gentler need: for the comfort of those like me; for laughter and lovely things; above all for forgiveness for having valued wisdom above the varieties of love.

When Anku nudged me I started and nearly fell into the shallow water. I kicked him away from me. He growled plaintively, but suddenly I wanted no more of him, no more of this forest or of the Curators and the evils they had awakened in me. I was turning to wade upstream, to where I thought the Tiger ran into the river, when I saw the figures lined upon either shore watching us.

In the moonlight they might almost have been enchanted trees, betulamias or bitter alders: thin figures with spindly arms upraised, silent, their eyes black in haggard faces. Four of them upon one bank, three on the other. Most were smaller than myself. Even in the dim light I could see that they were children; but more than children.

Lazars.

Beside me Anku stood alert. I glanced down at him. The eyes that met mine were so obviously fired by some uncanny intelligence that I shivered, standing in the middle of that warm and languid river. I lifted my head and met the gaze of the lazar who seemed the eldest. A girl, flanked by two boys upon the farther bank. Her long hair burned almost white by the sun, face dark as though stained by some dye. About her shoulders hung the remains of a yellow janissary’s jacket. A carcanet of braided human hair hung around her neck. The boys beside her were very young, seven or eight years perhaps. One of them had flaming red hair, and was making faces at the group on the other bank. When I caught his eyes he giggled and hid behind the tall girl. The others were young as well, so thin and dirty I could not make out if they were boys or girls, with their rags and tattered hanks of hair tied about their waists. None of them bore a weapon, save their eyes—huge and glittering and feverish: starved.

Still, they were so young and thin, and really they were only children, after all. I smiled, and took a step forward.

In an instant they were on me. I had a sideways glimpse of the two little boys springing from the sward before I fell. One of them clung to my back, kicking and screaming as he dug his fingernails into my neck. The other wrapped his arms around my knees. Then he butted me in the groin with his head. I doubled over in pain.

And panicked. They were lazars, not children: diseased ghouls. I tried to flee, but tripped and fell into the river. I felt the first boy clambering up my back until his weight forced my head beneath the water. I tried to knock him away, but now the air was shrill with their cries. I inhaled water, choking; felt other hands swarming over me. Then another sound, a hollow roar booming through the rush of water in my ears. A shriek, abruptly cut off. The knot of squirming hands withdrew. I rolled a few yards downstream, gagging and trying to wipe the water from my eyes as I staggered to my feet.

In the river six children now stood, the water roiling about their ankles. Anku half-crouched in the shallows among them. At his feet lay the red-haired boy, blood streaming from his torn throat like a tangle of his own bright hair. Coughing, I splashed upstream. Anku lifted his head, dipped his dark muzzle into the river until it was washed clean. Then he bounded to join me.

Three of the remaining lazars grabbed the dead child by his hands and dragged him to shore. The others drew closer to the tall girl. One wept silently, thumb in her mouth. Her eyes met mine beseechingly and I felt a stab of regret, that she looked to me—the oldest one present—for comfort. I turned to face the tall girl.

“Let me go,” I called to her. Anku pressed close against my leg. “I only seek passage to High Brazil. I must attend a Masque there—”

The girl took the hands of the two beside her and for the first time spoke. “They are hungry.” The children began to cry.