John Wright - Orphans of Chaos

It was only when looking at her that I realized (finally realized after Gabriel-knows how many years) what makeup was for. The sparkling eyes eyeliner tries to impersonate; the blood-red lips lipstick mimics; the cheeks flushed red; are what one sees on a girl when she is flushed with love. If someone had told me this Lady had stepped not five minutes ago from her lover’s arms, I would not have doubted it.

The Lady was toying with a hand mirror she held in her hand; holding it to one ear, then the other, turning her eyes sideways, as if she were trying to glimpse her own profile. She laughed her crystal laughter at herself; she prodded her hair with a slim white finger, teasing curls down before her eyes, which she went cross-eyed to stare at. Then she smiled again to see herself cross-eyed. She tossed her head when she laughed, like a girl half my age. It was as if she were in love with life itself, and every moment in it, and she could not restrain her joy.

Behind her were three women, who, if I had seen them on the covers of fashion magazines, would have called them beautiful. Next to the laughing one, however, they only seemed fair.

They were also dressed in simple white robes of a classical design. One of them held a sceptre on a pillow. One held a recurved bow of pale wood set with pink carbuncles, and a quiver of arrows fletched with red feathers. One had a jess and a leather guard on her wrist, like a falconer, but instead of a falcon, she held a white dove on her wrist.

Quentin pulled back. He turned himself on his back and put his elbow over his eyes.

I looked at him, puzzled. It was not until I looked at him that I realized something. I had been staring at the laughing beauty so earnestly, that I had not seen anyone else at the table, had not heard what they said.

I can tell in sort of an intellectual way if another woman is attractive or not. Sometimes. Sometimes, I am really surprised at which girls Colin, for example, would moon over, or which American movie starlets he would gather photos of, or write love letters to. But even I could tell this lady, this divinity, had a face to drive men mad. Quentin was covering his eyes to save his sanity.

My gaze was drawn back to her.

I had never seen an adult so unselfconscious in public. I have seen the Queen Mother and the Prince of Wales on television news, the Duchess of York, the King of Denmark, and the Prince of Monaco. They were royalty. They acted with gravity and polished politeness. This? This was something beyond royalty. A farmgirl in a barnyard could play this way, if she were surrounded by dumb animals, piglets and kittens and lambs. Because the farmgirl is still a higher order of being than even the noblest animal, and she can feel no shame in front of them, no more than a high cloud, or a distant star, can feel shame in front of a human.

I wished I could see if she would have that same rainbow effect the Red Soldier had. Unfortunately, there was nothing beyond her, from my point of view, aside from the chair she sat on, the floor. No light sources. Not even a reflection.

But I moved a little to one side, so that the marble banister blocked my view of her. That was the only way I could concentrate on the others gathered here.

The moment I saw them, I wondered how I could have not been staring at them. This was an odd group. A very odd group.

Two foxes in Japanese kimonos stood behind their chairs to the Lady’s far left. They stood on their hind legs, like men. One of them was smoking a cigarette in a holder.

A man with no head was next. He was dressed in eighteenth-century garb: a great coat with a high collar, bloodstained lace surrounding his neck stump, two dueling pistols tucked through his belt. He had a long-necked guitar slung on a wide bandoleer over his left shoulder. On a silver plate, on the table before where he stood, rested his head. I assume it was his.

A bearded head it was, with long black locks. The eyes were open and looking back and forth. Every now and again the headless body would raise a hand and absentmindedly run fingers through the hair of the head, the way a man with a dog at his heel might pet it from time to time.

Next to him was a Satyr, with ivy wound around his goat horns. He had narrow features and lines around his mouth. He was shifting from hoof to hoof, and picking his teeth with a toothpick.

Two nude women were next, naked except for the grape leaves they had wound in their hair. They stood with their arms around each other’s waists, and occasionally whispered comments in each other’s ears.

Next was a man made entirely of metal. This golem was ten or twelve feet tall. The metal was silvery and black, and chased through with designs, images, and arabesques of the most cunning workmanship. The elbow joints were fretted like fish fins; the vambraces had pastoral scenes running up them. The helm was furrowed with whippet hounds; the crest was a lunging stag, every vein in its straining throat visible. Leaves and trees, maple and oak, ran in vertical stripes down the breastplate. The face mask was silver, a man smiling gently, surrounded by leaves and little birds growing from his beard. The hairs of the beard were separately etched in, overlaying with strips of silver, silver-gray, blue steel, black iron.

Beyond the metal man was another, this one of gold, inscribed with scenes of sailing ships, kings, rising suns. An eagle crest started from his helm. His beard was curled with golden flames.

Then came the three women, and the Lady with the mirror who was so beautiful.

Another gold man was beyond her, this one inscribed with mountain scenes, goatherds, pine trees. His crest was a dragon, each scale studded with a different gem.

Another silver man was next, this one done up in night images, moons and owls.

A man made out of bark stood behind the next chair, with leaves for hair. His face was carved from unpolished wood, scabby and black.

A normal-looking fellow was next, except he wore a folded robe of purest blue that floated and flowed around him. Clouds moved through the fabric. His hair also floated in the wind, except that there was no wind.

There was a man in scale armor. The scales were enameled with different shades of white, pale blue, dark blue, green, and black. He was young, and broad-shouldered, with long black hair. His helmet was on the table before him; it had a leaping dolphin for its crest. He did not look impatient, but he was pinching his nostrils shut, opening them, pinching them shut again, over and over. I do not mean he was touching his nose with his hand. His hands were clasped behind his back. When he turned his head to whisper some comment to the man dressed in the blue wind, I could see feathery dark lines of the gills behind his ear.

Next came two men in well-tailored business suits, dark blue pinstripe with narrow ties. Both had gold rings, tastefully expensive wristwatches, shining cuff links. One stood puffing a cigarette. Balanced on the back of the chair before him was the smallest computer I had ever seen, a folding thing no bigger than a large book. He was typing on it with both hands.

The other man, who was older, was speaking on a cell phone. They seemed to be men. Nothing extraordinary about them…

Until the one on the laptop computer, without taking either hand off the keyboard, had a third hand reach up from under his coat, take the cigarette between two fingers, and flick ash onto the carpet. From the way the hand blurred where it left his coat, I assumed I was looking at a three-dimensional intrusion from four-space.

Next was a busty dark-skinned woman, a Turk or a Hindu, perhaps, wearing a short red vest with nothing beneath it, a headdress of coins. She was a giant serpent from the waist down.