Michael Swanwick - Dancing with Bears

And indeed, in short order the pantry was cleared and made into a sickroom. Into it were brought first a featherbed, then the ailing Prince Achmed, and finally two long-bearded doctors.

(“They are the best doctors in town,” Gulagsky remarked to Darger under his breath, “but only because there are no others.”)

The doctors had scarcely closed the sickroom door behind them when two Neanderthals lumbered down from their post at the top of the stairs. “Only those who belong here can stay,” one announced.“Anyone who tries to go upstairs will be killed.” With a hulking menace that was perilously close to grace, they cleared the ground floor of all but Arkady and his father, the doctors, and his father’s two new friends.

Finally, when this chore was accomplished and all was still, a third Neanderthal descended the stairs, followed closely by a dark panther of a maiden-tall, slim yet strongly built, with flashing gray eyes, ebony hair, and an imperious manner. Hers was a beauty so rare as to be encountered only once or luckily twice in a human lifetime. Being indoors and in a house, moreover, requisitioned specifically for her and the other Pearls-which made it, for the nonce, an honorary palace-she had discarded her chaste and concealing chador for the immodest and diaphanous silks of Byzantium.

“Zoesophia,” Darger said warmly, though not, Arkady suspected, with total sincerity. “Your beauty dazzles our eyes and ennobles our drab and humdrum lives.”

Zoesophia’s face was like finely chiseled stone. One of the Neanderthals grinned and cracked his knuckles threateningly. Unfolding a sheet of paper, the Pearl said,“I have compiled a list of a few small things we require. To begin, a basket of kittens, several packs of playing cards, balls of yarn in every color and seven pairs of knitting needles, preferably ivory, six dozen long-stem roses without thorns-”

“Roses without thorns?” Darger asked bemusedly.

“Nymphodora always manages to prick herself.” Zoesophia scowled as Surplus turned away, hiding his mouth with a hastily drawn handkerchief. “So there must be absolutely no thorns.”

“I know where roses are to be found,” Arkady said. “Dark red, rich-scented, and in full bloom. I shall be happy to remove the thorns myself.”

As if no one had spoken, Zoesophia continued, “We also require scented soaps, clothing such as fashionable Russian women wear, in a variety of sizes, at least three seamstresses to make adjustments, a cobbler-female, of course-to make us all new shoes, a balalaika, sheet music in both popular and traditional styles, and enough books to fill several shelves, on a variety of topics both frivolous and intellectual.”

Gulagsky cleared his throat. “The only books we have are in Russian.”

Zoesophia’s stare would have stunned a basilisk. “We all read Russian perfectly, thank you.”

“That will require rather a lot of money,” Surplus observed.

“I have no doubt of that. See that it is spent.” Zoesophia handed the list to the first Neanderthal, who handed it to the second, who handed it to Darger. Then she turned, revealing a back that was both wholly admirable and almost entirely naked, and ascended the stairs again, to the intense interest of all four men.

Somebody sighed as the door closed on her perfect if thinly covered backside. There was a long moment of silence.

“Well,” said Darger, when all had recovered themselves. “That leaves us with a problem. Our money is in a lock-box controlled by the Neanderthals, whose programming is such that they will not open it, however great the need, without explicit permission of the ambassador. Who is, I fear, in no condition to grant it.”

“Whatever shall we-” Surplus began to say, when suddenly there came a great booming knock at the front door. It sounded like somebody was trying to knock it down with a sledgehammer.

Arkady was closest. A little fearful, but determined not to show it, he unlatched the door.

It swung open, flinging Arkady aside.

Into the house, like a beast from the desert, strode Koschei, a leather pouch slung over his shoulder. When Magog, the Neanderthal standing guard in the vestibule, stepped into his path, he shoved the brute to the side. Leaning his staff against the wall so forcefully that it left a mark on the wallpaper, the strannik turned his dark glare on Gulagsky. “You have impaled the machine-beast on a sharpened pole by the city gate and left it there to rot,” he said.“Remove that ungodly abomination and throw its body into the fields outside the city to be eaten by ravens and crows.”

Surplus gestured to Magog not to interfere. Gulagsky pushed out his chest. “I meant that to serve as a deterrent for our enemies, and I think-”

“I do not care what you mean or think. I only care that you obey.” The strannik rounded on Darger. “I will see your prince. There is a service he must do me.”

“Regrettably, that’s not possible.” “Nor do I care what you regret. He must take me to Moscow.”

“It simply cannot be done.”

“It will be done.” Koschei’s eyes blazed. “Moscow is the second Babylon, and this city of whores and heretics must be cleansed-with the word of God if possible, but if not, then with fire!”

Surplus gestured toward the sickroom. “What my friend means is that the ambassador is not conscious. The doctors are with him now. But he is gravely ill, and I fear they can do him little good.”

“Oh?” In three strides, Koschei was in the sickroom and had pulled shut the door behind him. Two voices rose in protest, but if the wanderer made reply, Arkady could not hear it. For several minutes the voices clamored louder and more agitatedly until suddenly the strannik emerged again, hoisting the doctors up by the napes of their coats, so high that their feet struggled and failed to reach the ground. One after the other, he threw them out the front door. Then he fetched their bags and threw them after. Magog bemusedly closed the door on the two. “They are impious men,” Koschei said. “You can expect no good from them.”

“Good pilgrim, I must protest!” Surplus cried. “Those men were needed to heal the ambassador.”

“The power to heal him belongs to God alone, and from what I have seen of the ambassador, I do not think that Mighty Gentleman will deign to do so.” Koschei unslung his pouch and dropped it at his feet. “Yet I have medicines of my own, and I know much about the human body that your doctors do not. If you wish, I have every confidence that I can return this lost soul to consciousness for a time, so that he might put his affairs in order.”

Darger and Surplus looked at one another. “Yes,” said one of them. “That would be desirable.”

By now, Arkady was finding the conversation almost unbearably tedious. The Pearls required flowers! There was a girl who perhaps-he was ashamed to admit it, even to himself-still had reason to think he was romantically attached to her, and her mother grew the finest roses in town, great hedges of them. They would neither of them miss a few dozen, provided he was careful not to cut many from the same area.

As he edged out the door, he heard the strannik say, “This will take some time. I will require your patience and your silence.”

The town was much quieter when Arkady returned an hour later. So was the house. The gapers and onlookers had all retired for the night and there was only one dim lantern burning on the ground floor. On the front stoop, a small glowing coal and the smell of tobacco identified a great hulking shadow as a Neanderthal sitting guard, smoking a pipe. Yet the second floor was ablaze with oil lamps. The Pearls were apparently too excited by their release from the confines of the caravans to sleep. He could hear a sudden peel of girlish laughter, and then the screech of a heavy piece of furniture being drawn across a bare wood floor. The soft sound of bare feet ran swiftly from one side of the house to the other.