"This isn"t the time-"
"Tell me."
"Well, mystifs have their rites, just like men and women. Don"t worry, I won"t make you spy on me. You"ll be invited invited, if that"s what you want."
The remotest twinge of fear touched Gentle as he listened to this. He"d become almost blase about the many wonders they"d witnessed as they traveled, but the creature that had been at his side these many days remained, he realized, undiscovered. He had never seen it naked since that first encounter in New York; nor kissed it the way a lover might kiss; nor allowed himself to feel s.e.xual towards it. Perhaps it was because he"d been thinking of the women here, and their secret rites, but now, like it or not, he was looking at Pie"oh"pah and was aroused.
Pain diverted him from these thoughts, and he looked down at his hands to see that in his unease he"d made fists of them and reopened the cuts in his palms. Blood dropped onto the ice underfoot, shockingly red. With the sight of it came a memory he"d consigned to the back of his head.
"What"s wrong?" Pie said.
But Gentle didn"t have the breath to reply. He could hear the frozen river cracking beneath him, and the howl of the Unbeheld"s agents wheeling overhead. He could feel his hand slamming, slamming, slamming against the glacier and the thorns of ice flying up into his face.
The mystif had come to his side. "Gentle," it said, anxious now. "Speak to me, will you? What"s wrong?"
It put its arms around Gentle"s shoulders, and at its touch Gentle drew breath.
"The women..." he said.
"What about them?"
"It was me who freed them."
"How?"
"Pneuma. How else?"
"You undid undid the Unbeheld"s handiwork?" the mystif said, its voice barely audible. "For our sake I hope the women were the only witnesses." the Unbeheld"s handiwork?" the mystif said, its voice barely audible. "For our sake I hope the women were the only witnesses."
"There were agents, just as you said there"d be. They almost killed me. But I hurt them back."
"This is bad news."
"Why? If I"m going to bleed, let Him Him bleed a little too." bleed a little too."
"Hapexamendios doesn"t bleed."
"Everything bleeds, Pie. Even G.o.d. Maybe especially G.o.d. Or else why did He hide Himself away?"
As he spoke the tinkling bells sounded again, closer than ever, and glancing over Gentle"s shoulder Pie said, "She must have been waiting for that little heresy."
Gentle turned to see the beckoning woman standing halfway in shadow at the end of the sanctum. The ice that still clung to her body hadn"t melted, suggesting that, like the walls, the flesh it was encrusted upon was still below zero. There were cobs of ice in her hair, and when she moved her head a little, as she did now, they struck each other and tinkled like tiny bells.
"I brought you out of the ice," Gentle said, stepping past Pie to approach her.
The woman said nothing.
"Do you understand me?" Gentle went on, "Will you lead us out of here? We want to find a way through the mountain."
The woman took a step backwards, retreating into the shadows.
"Don"t be afraid of me," Gentle said. "Pie! Help me out here."
"How?"
"Maybe she doesn"t understand English."
"She understands you well enough."
"Just talk to her, will you?" Gentle said.
Ever obedient, Pie began to speak in a tongue Gentle hadn"t heard before, its musicality rea.s.suring even if the words were unintelligible. But neither music nor sense seemed to impress the woman. She continued to retreat into the darkness, Gentle pursuing cautiously, fearful of startling her but more fearful still of losing her entirely. His additions to Pie"s persuasions had dwindled to the basest bargaining.
"One favor deserves another," he said.
Pie was right, she did indeed understand. Even though she stood in shadow, he could see that a little smile was playing on her sealed lips. d.a.m.n her, he thought, why wouldn"t she answer him? The bells still rang in her hair, however, and he kept following them even when the shadows became so heavy she was virtually lost among them. He glanced back towards the mystif, who had by now given up any attempt to communicate with the woman and instead addressed Gentle.
"Don"t go any further," it said.
Though he was no more than fifty yards from where the mystif stood, its voice sounded unnaturally remote, as though another law besides that of distance and light held sway in the s.p.a.ce between them.
"I"m still here. Can you see me?" he called back, and, gratified to hear the mystif reply that it could, he returned his gaze to the shadows. The woman had disappeared however. Cursing, he plunged on towards the place where she"d last stood, his sense that this was equivocal terrain intensifying. The darkness had a nervous quality, like a bad liar attempting to shoo him off with shrugs. He wouldn"t go. The more it trembled, the more eager he became to see what it was hiding. Sightless though he was, he wasn"t blind to the risk he was taking. Minutes before he"d told Pie that everything was vulnerable. But n.o.body, not even the Unbeheld, could make darkness bleed. If it closed on him he could claw at it forever and not make a mark on its hideless back. He heard Pie calling behind him now: "Where the h.e.l.l are you?"
The mystif was following him into the shadows, he saw.
"Don"t come any further," he told it.
"Why not?"
"I may need a marker to find my way back."
"Just turn around."
"Not till I find her," Gentle said, forging on with his arms outstretched.
The floor was slick beneath him, and he had to proceed with extreme caution. But without the woman to guide them through the mountain, this maze might prove as fatal as the snows they"d escaped. He had to find her.
"Can you still hear me?" he called back to Pie.
The voice that told him yes was as faint as a long-distance call on a failing line.
"Keep talking," he yelled.
"What do you want me to say?"
"Anything. Sing a song."
"I"m tone deaf."
"Talk about food, then."
"All right," said Pie, "I already told you about the ugichee and the bellyful of eggs-"
"It"s the foulest thing I ever heard," Gentle replied.
"You"ll like it once you taste it."
"As the actress said to the bishop."
He heard Pie"s muted laughter come his way. Then the mystif said, "You hated me almost as much as you hated fish, remember? And I converted you."
"I never hated you."
"In New York you did."
"Not even then. I was just confused. I"d never slept with a mystif before."
"How did you like it?"
"It"s better than fish but not as good as chocolate."
"What did you say?"
"I said-"
"Gentle? I can hardly hear you."
"I"m still here!" he replied, shouting now. "I"d like to do it again sometime, Pie."
"Do what?"
"Sleep with you."
"I"ll have to think about it."
"What do you want, a proposal of marriage?"
"That might do it."
"All right!" Gentle called back. "So marry me!"
There was silence behind him. He stopped and turned. Pie"s form was a blurred shadow against the distant light of the sanctum.
"Did you hear me?" he yelled.
"I"m thinking it over."
Gentle laughed, despite the darkness and the unease it had wrung from him. "You can"t take forever, Pie," he hollered. "I need an answer in-" He stopped as his outstretched fingers made contact with something frozen and solid. "Oh s.h.i.t s.h.i.t."
"What"s wrong?"
"It"s a f.u.c.king dead end!" he said, stepping right up to the surface he"d encountered and running his palms over the ice. "Just a blank wall."
But that wasn"t the whole story. The suspicion he"d had that this was nebulous territory was stronger than ever. There was something on the other side of this wall, if he could only reach it.
"Make your way back," he heard Pie entreating.
"Not yet," he said to himself, knowing the words wouldn"t reach the mystif. He raised his hand to his mouth and s.n.a.t.c.hed an expelled breath.
"Did you hear me, Gentle?" Pie called.
Without replying he slammed the pneuma against the wall, a technique his palm was now expert in. The sound of the blow was swallowed by the murk, but the force he unleashed shook a freezing hail down from the roof. He didn"t wait for the reverberations to settle but delivered a second blow, and a third, each impact opening further the wounds in his hand, adding blood to the violence of his blows. Perhaps it fueled them. If his breath and spittle did such service, what power might his blood contain, or his s.e.m.e.n?
As he stopped to draw a fresh lungful, he heard the mystif yelling, and turned to see it moving towards him across a gulf of frantic shadow. It wasn"t just the wall and the roof above that was shaken by his a.s.sault: the very air was in a furor, shaking Pie"s silhouette into fragments. As his eyes fought to fix the image, a vast spear of ice divided the s.p.a.ce between them, hitting the ground and shattering. He had time to raise his arms over his face before the shards struck him, but their impact threw him back against the wall.
"You"ll bring the whole place down!" he heard Pie yell as new spears fell.
"It"s too late to change our minds!" Gentle replied. "Move, Pie!"
Light-footed, even on this lethal ground, the mystif dodged through the ice towards Gentle"s voice. Before it was even at his side, he turned to attack the wall afresh, knowing that if it didn"t capitulate very soon they"d be buried where they stood. s.n.a.t.c.hing another breath from his lips he delivered it against the wall, and this time the shadows failed to swallow the sound. It rang out like a thunderous bell. The shock wave would have pitched him to the floor had the mystif s arms not been there to catch him. "This is a pa.s.sing place!" it yelled.
"What does that mean?"
"Two breaths this time," was its reply. "Mine as well as yours, in one hand. Do you understand me?"
"Yes."
He couldn"t see the mystif, but he felt it raise his hand to its mouth.
"On a count of three," Pie said. "One."
Gentle drew a breathful of furious air.
"Two."
He drew again, deeper still.
"Three!"
And he expelled it, mingled with Pie"s, into his hand. Human flesh wasn"t designed to govern such force. Had Pie not been beside him to brace his shoulder and wrist, the power would have erupted from his palm and taken his hand with it. But they flung themselves forward in unison, and he opened his hand the instant before it struck the wall. The roar from above redoubled, but it was drowned out moments later by the havoc they"d wrought ahead of them. Had there been room to retreat they"d have done so, but the roof was pitching down a fusillade of stalact.i.tes, and all they could do was shield their bare heads and stand their ground as the wall stoned them for their crime, knocking them to their knees as it split and fell. The commotion went on for what seemed like minutes, the ground shuddering so violently they were thrown down yet again, this time to their faces. Then, by degrees, the convulsions slowed. The hail of stone and ice became a drizzle, and stopped, and a miraculous gust brought warm wind to their faces.
They looked up. The air was murky, but light was catching glints off the daggers they lay on, and its source was somewhere up ahead. The mystif was first to its feet, hauling Gentle up beside it.
"A pa.s.sing place," it said again.
It put its arm around Gentle"s shoulders, and together they stumbled towards the warmth that had roused them. Though the gloom was still deep, they could make out the vague presence of the wall. For all the scale of the upheaval, the fissure they"d made was scarcely more than a man"s height. On the other side it was foggy, but each step took them closer to the light. As they went, their feet sinking into a soft sand that was the color of the fog, they heard the ice bells again and looked back, expecting to see the women following. But the fog already obscured the fissure and the sanctum beyond, and when the bells stopped, as they did moments later, they lost all sense of its direction.
"We"ve come out into the Third Dominion," Pie said.