Elizabeth Hand - Winterlong

Before I could pass, the one she called Johannes blinked and with great effort lifted his head.

“Ah,” he mumbled; then choked and with a strangled yelp drew back, smacking his head against the banister. This stirred the third in their menage, a very thin young girl with black hair and the slanted ebony eyes of Persia. For an instant, wonder and fear stained her sharp features with a piquant flash of crimson. Then:

“It’s a costume, ” she said, annoyed. She turned to display shoulder blades incised with threads of gold from which tiny black feathers fluttered. “You idiot, Johannes.” With a petulant yawn she reached for him; but he pushed her away and continued to stare at me wide-eyed.

“A costume,” I repeated, nudging Anku to continue.

Johannes shook his head as Anku pattered down the next two steps. When I started to follow he raised both hands before his breast and crossed them at the wrists, palms opened to me. The Persian girl tittered.

“He’s a Saint-Alaban.” She giggled as I stepped over her long legs. “ So superstitious!”

The Saint-Alaban turned on her and in a flurry of squeals the three resumed their sally. -‘

We wandered through the crowd, Anku and I. The rev’elers scarcely noticed me; even Anku received few surprised glances. From one dim corner of the hall a sweet sound echoed through ripples of laughter and the clamor of pipes. I followed this to a recess where water purled from a marble fountain. Drowned moths floated on its surface like blossoms. I swept the poor dead things from a brass spigot shaped like a peccary’s head. Dipping my face in the scented water, I washed away the grime, then unbound my hair and let it fall into the basin. Afterward I dried myself as best I could, leaving my hair to dry wild and tangled about my shoulders.

“Here,” I called to Anku. Filling my cupped hands with water, I bowed to let him drink greedily. “Supper next.”

A passing couple glanced at me and tittered behind their velvet dominos. I stared back at them coldly. The taller of the two (a spado, I guessed by his hairless, somewhat fleshy face and sweet childish voice) paused to gaze at me from gray eyes half-hidden in the folds of his domino.

“Ill-met, young Lord Death,” he said. He tilted his head to indicate my tattered clothes and the looped vine dangling from my neck. His partner clung limply to his arm and glanced at me sideways, a painted fantoccio draped in scarlet.

“An original conceit,” she murmured, her husky voice deepened still more by chloral. “The Saint-Alabans will forfeit their place in the masquerade rather than be judged alongside a likeness of the Hanged Boy.”

The spado nodded and stretched a hand to graze my cheek. “Will you join us in strappado, Hanged Boy?” he asked, lips parting to show a ruby placebit glimmering in a front tooth. One long pale leg slid from the folds of his domino to rub against my thigh.

I shook my head but did not move away, liking the feel of his smooth limb against mine. “I am looking for a Curator,” I said.

“Many of us will find Patrons tonight,” the woman murmured, leaning forward to gaze at her reflection in the sparkling basin. “There’s luck in threes—come with us.” She took my hand and pressed it between her legs, so that for a moment I felt only heat and the gentle sweep of velvet falling about my arm. Behind me I heard a faint growl. I looked back to see Anku watching from the fountain.

“A jealous companion,” laughed the spado. From beneath his domino he drew a long quirt of braided hide. “Come with us, Boy.” He prodded me gently with the cord. “My Patron is Constance Beech, a Botanist. She will be delighted to introduce you to her fellows. Come with us.”

From the echoing hall erupted shrill laughter and cheers. I peered vainly into the swirling shadows to see what this heralded.

“They’ve brought out the ORPHEUS ,” said the woman. “Oh, do come dance!”

“The Curator I am looking for is a Naturalist,” I said quickly, grabbing her hand and pressing it to my breast. “A Regent. Roland Nopcsa. Do you know him?”

She shook her head and turned to her companion. “A Regent. Constance might know him.” She slipped her hand back into the folds of her mantle.

The spado nodded, “I know him: he engaged me once as Inquisitor for an esclandre. Constance attended the excruciation with us.” He tapped my shoulder with his quirt. “But he has engaged Whitlock High Brazil this evening, Boy! You know that, eh?”

His cool gaze met mine. I lowered my face so that he would not see the color that flooded my cheeks. “Yes indeed,” I said. “Whitlock and I were paired at Winterlong—you remember us, perhaps?”

The spado regarded me through narrowed eyes, nodding slowly. “You had a different look, then,” he said at last. “I know you now. The favorite of the House Miramar. Raphael.” He turned and grasped his partner’s elbow. “See, cousin! This is the boy I told you of, the Miramar—”

“But he is not so young, Nataniel,” she protested, tugging at his domino. “And we’re late—we’ll miss the cacique’s judging if we don’t hurry.”

“No, you are not so young,” the spado Nataniel agreed. He raised the butt of his whip to my chin and tilted it back an inch. “Eighteen?”

“Seventeen!”

“Seventeen, then … but seventeen has bright empty eyes gazing ever forward, and already yours are full of old dreams and brooding on the past.”

I started to make a sharp reply, but the spado only raised his quirt to gently tap my lips: once, twice, thrice. His eyes were keen and bespoke Silence.

“I had a summer’s folly with Roland Nopcsa once, Boy Miramar,” he said. A glance at his companion showed her more intent upon the Great Hall than upon either of us. “He took rather more liberties with a promising young chaunter than perhaps he should. My House—Illyria, but you knew that, eh?—my House was not pleased with Nopcsa’s inspiration, although they did gain a fine soprano for chanting the “Duties of Pleasure.” A dedicated ear for fine music, Sieur Nopcsa …

“I hear he has engaged the Exiguous Hagioscopic Chamber this evening for a private recital with Whitlock prior to the bestowing of the cacique’s jewels.”

“Indeed,” I said, and snapped my fingers in Anku’s direction. “Where might a lover of music find the Exiguous Hagioscopic Chamber?”

Nataniel drew the hem of his domino away from Anku’s anxious tread and pointed across the hall. “Through the archway carven with the image of a jaguarondi seizing a great fish,” he murmured, then extended his arm to embrace his companion. “Come then, Dido! This boy will not join us, but the gynander Anstice Helen has as pretty a face and she is waiting.”

The two of them bowed to me, Nataniel kissing his three fingers and reaching to brush Anku’s muzzle as he passed.

“Fare well, Miramar,” he called softly. “Tell Nopcsa that Nataniel Illyria taught you a song to sing him: ‘ Toujours Jeune.’” They disappeared into the shadows.

I PAUSED, WONDERING IF I should go now to confront Roland, then glanced after the spado and his partner.

At the far end of the hall a great press of dancers had gathered. In their center reared the luminous pilasters and glass pipes of High Brazil’s great electrocalliope ORPHEUS . High above the throng glowed its metal cabinet. Bright figures—dancers in dark glasses, women wearing silver headbands, autovehicles spinning on metal wheels—flickered beneath the elaborately lettered scroll still gleaming with bright blue and yellow metallic paint:

THE ECHO MUSICAL MACHINE COMPANY OF NORTHERN AMERICA