City of Ruin

SEVENTEEN

'It's as if you're composed from a different fabric than before. I don't know what to make of your mannerisms any more, your tentative gestures and insecurities. Could you even be the same person as you were some years ago?'

How could she answer that?

Physically things were good, they always had been. Opening up was something she would never consider with Malum, and slowly, slowly she was beginning to remember. To learn again.

'Where's your confidence gone? Where're your nuances for mocking me, like I loved so long ago?'

He mellows me… 'I need time. Sometimes I feel stressed thinking about such things.'

Again they came to that world with no name. Earlier in the day, they had discovered a beach, and in his eagerness he declared it for himself.

'Lupus Beach is a suitable name for a beautiful place,' he laughed, then changed the subject, as if aware of her sudden unease.

There came an urge, later, to map this place, this other realm, and maybe it was his soldier's mind demanding to analyse everything, to apply a systematic logic to her world. She discouraged him at first, explaining that the place seemed to change slightly with time. No matter how much of this world she saw, each new visit would bring variants – different species of trees, or water carving fractionally different paths for the rivers.

'You just can't apply logic,' she insisted, watching him frown, 'to a place that doesn't obey any logic.'

His explorations didn't stop there: he moved onwards to the curves and blemishes of her body, tasting her skin, which perspired in this heat. The tide came in to drench their half-discarded clothing, her dark hair was left wet, and sand clung to their damp and sweaty bodies.

*

A stove-hot meadow now, the two of them lying in the grass, bright orchids, a flock of some bird species she had never seen before cutting through the sky in a V-formation, their calls utterly alien. Something that had a hexagonal spine and six legs rotated peculiarly along the grassland to drink from the river, and it seemed impossible to Lupus that such a creature could exist.

Because he didn't know where or what this place was, it presented itself as artificial. It was a world without context. A world frozen, ironically and practically, in time. Beami wondered what would happen if they remained here permanently, but there was very little around for her to measure herself against. It was simply a world to escape into, a world in which they could conduct their affair without being discovered.

Lupus noticed a cluster of bruises across Beami's back, and the narrow scoring across her shoulder. Shuddering gently, she let him run his fingers along them. Softly.

'I can do something, you know,' he offered. 'Have a word or two with the lads.'

'You can do nothing, Lupus.'

'Makes me angry.'

'And you think I'm not angry, too? Leave it alone. I give as good as I get.'

'I'm sorry. I'm just a fool who thinks he can solve all your problems.'

Mellowing, she realized he only meant well. This conversation was almost impossible to start on. 'He gets angry, but I'm not some meek woman. He's hit me, yes, but once I even used a relic to stop him, and he didn't even notice.'

A garuda came in, one of the local, feral ones, with different colouring from those found in the Boreal Archipelago, their plumages brighter and, of course, with no armour at all. It swooped in about forty paces from them, skimmed the tip of the grasses, its head craning in their direction, then banked away towards the deep blue.

She said, 'It's all because he hasn't been able to have sex for some time.'

'How do you mean?'

'He…' she searched for the right words. 'He's impotent, and he hates to talk about it. For us women, that's acceptable, isn't it? We can talk openly about how we feel – well, most of us can. But all he can say is that he doesn't feel like a man any more – the rest of it he says with his rage. Maybe that's why he leads such a dark life. I don't know half of what he gets up to any more. I used to be attracted to the element of danger – you know what I'm like – but I know it's not me. I'm not some dumb, weak-willed heiress who can't even wipe her own rear. It isn't me. It's only important to him to be able to… fuck. Let's say it – that's what it is, isn't it?' After dwelling on this thought for a moment, she faced him again. 'I've craved you for so long, you know.'

'Merely glad to be of assistance,' Lupus replied. His smile diffused the tension. 'And my rates are very reasonable these days.'

'You became a man-whore while you were in the army, did you? All those lonely soldiers away from home…'

'You'd love it there, all those men…'

'Hell, yes,' she said.

'Pervert.'

'Dickhead,' she said.

They kissed.

The first signs of dusk, a change in temperature, a shift in wind and the smells of vegetation gaining in intensity. The wolf came again, delighting Lupus. He leapt up as soon as he saw its face peering from within a cluster of sedges – two curious eyes.

'Hey,' he called out gently. He walked towards it wearing only the trousers of his uniform, carrying some of the meat they'd brought earlier. He crouched, offered the meat, while the animal cautiously approached. At first it just sniffed, twisting its head this way and that. Then with a quick nip, it plucked the meat from his grasp and withdrew into the sedges.

Lupus merely laughed, then returned to Beami.

'You two are a bit like each other,' she observed.

'How d'you mean?'

'A brief appearance, take the good stuff, then disappear again.'

'That's not fair. I need to get back to the barracks for training and strategy. I'd take you with me, if you wanted. You only have to say the word… but you're married.'

'It's just not easy,' Beami sighed. 'He works so hard and provides us with that magnificent home, amazing food. I can't say he doesn't love me exactly. He just gets angry, but sometimes I think he'll change, that I can help him change. This was what I was like, Lupus, until you came along. You've ruined everything.'

Beami began to cry into his shoulder, a gentle relief so it seemed, letting out the pressure of her situation, of her lack of control.

*

Later in this otherworld, night fell – and it seemed even more sudden with that fantastical yellow sun.

They lay on long grass throughout the balmy evening, staring up at the skies, while a warm wind came from the coast, and the trees had begun releasing perfume into the evening, smells he had never before known. Beami lay with her head on Lupus's chest, and his compound bow and quiver lay just to his right side, within easy reach. They watched the stars for some time, and it felt to her as if there was only the one moon here, the larger and brighter one. Sure it might look a bit out of alignment, but still…

'We should probably sleep here, tonight,' Beami suggested. 'If we return to the same moment in time in Villiren, then we'd need to appear fresh and not tired else people might suspect there was something up with us both.'

For a moment he thought a comet flashed at the periphery of his vision.

'The star formations,' he whispered, 'they're more or less the same as when we're back in the city, aren't they? Perhaps they're out of sync a little.'

'I've not noticed,' Beami replied. 'I've not spent too many evenings out here on my own.'

Perhaps it was a soldier's obsession for these things but, after studying the stars further, he became convinced of their location. 'We're actually in Villiren. This is still the same place. We're just at a different point in time.'

Beami said nothing for a moment, then, 'That makes sense. The topography has been reasonably identical and we're near the coast still. There are those higher cliffs sheltering the natural harbour, just like in the city. How far back in time do you think we are?'

Their conversation continued in such speculation until Lupus drifted into sleep, leaving Beami to regard the stars serenely.

*

She didn't know how long she had been staring upwards when a block of the sky began to change texture. The wind altered fractionally, calming a little, then the stars in one quadrant became obscured by some massive translucent presence. In a precise shape looming above, a huge oblong the size of a small town, the stars became hazy, almost vibrating, and then were blocked entirely by something that was darker, more textured. Wind gathered momentum, the trees in the distance fizzing, and birds burst cover, startled. Beami's heart beat rapidly, but she was too stunned to wake Lupus. She merely stared dumbly upwards.

An utter silence fell as the presence loitered in the sky above some distance from the ground. How far away it was, she couldn't be sure, but for a moment it did appear to be a town of sorts, because it reminded her of the windows seen nightly in the city.

And hardly had this entity appeared when it disintegrated into nothingness, leaving the starscape exactly as before. She eased herself away from Lupus's sleeping form, and for the next quarter of an hour she paced the nearby meadow, all the time craning her neck upwards waiting for the shape to return.

*

Their affair was locked safely in another place, another time, another dimension entirely. But now they were back in her house, in Malum's house, the guilt came storming into her mind, like a raid on her senses.

Lupus tried to nuzzle against her neck, offering a comfort too far. With the tips of her fingers she traced the crispness of his uniform. He was so organized and neat for such a laid-back personality, so well groomed. The army must have taught him this discipline, she decided.

Suddenly Beami pushed him away and said, 'Not here, not while we're so exposed.'

She couldn't even meet his eyes. Over his shoulder she could see the snow descending outside the window, nothing like as harsh as it had been, but still a constant reminder of the troubles everyone in this city faced.

'What's wrong now?' he growled.

How could he not understand, despite all that she'd already said? 'Don't you even care if we get caught?'

'Not really, no.'

'Well, I do, OK. It's my life that could be ruined.'

'I could be your life, Bea. Me alone. Once I'm finished here in the city, I'll quit the army.'

'You're already married to it. With me you're cheating on your marriage too.'

'I'll quit, just after-'

'The war, I know,' she interrupted. 'After the war in which nearly everyone in this city might die. Do you think I want to give up everything just for the promise of a man who might be killed at any moment? Can you even begin to understand the consequences of that?'

'Why say all this now? We've talked about this before.' Lupus placed a hand on her shoulder, but she shrugged it off.

Why did you join the army in the first place? she wanted to say. Why do you still have to be a soldier, the second time you invade my life?

Footsteps approaching outside. Her heart missed a beat as she shoved him away, whispering, 'Malum.' Lupus nodded his comprehension, moving further from her.

The door opened and in stepped her husband, a hessian sack in one hand, his gaze settling on them from within the darkness of his raised hood.

Beami felt as if her whole life was about to implode.

Lupus saluted him. 'Sele of Jamur, sir.'

Malum stood there in his mask – something she once regarded with awe, but now found ridiculous. Still in the doorway, he was assessing the situation he had walked into.

'What're you doing here, soldier?' Malum growled.

Lupus's voice maintained a perfect calm. 'I'm visiting as many of the establishments around the Ancient Quarter as possible, briefing them on the potential hazards that may soon arise. There may be a possibility for rehousing, should you consider it safer.'

'The hell we will,' he grunted; then to Beami, 'This man hassling you?'

'It's no trouble. I understand what a soldier must do – for the good of the city.'

'Whatever.'

Lupus then addressed Malum again. 'Do I recognize you, sir?'

'I doubt it.'

'Sir, madam, good day.' Lupus nodded to them both. He left Beami alone with her husband.

She tried to remain looking utterly calm.

'Fucking soldiers.' Malum closed the door. 'Think just because this city's under threat they can get away with anything.'

'Do you think we've anything to be worried about?' Beami tried to meet his gaze, as if showing she had nothing to hide.

He pushed back his hood, placed the sack on the floor. 'Nothing at all. You're safe here with me, right?'

'Right. What's in the sack?'

'Thought we deserved a decent meal tonight…'

'That's very kind.' It pained her even more to see how he was making an effort to be nice to her. Seeing him like this it… just made her want to at least try. Was she mad for risking herself in this situation? Surely she should take some control of her emotions.

She was a cultist, after all! She was meant to be this powerful woman who could utilize ancient technology, and here she was being so… pathetic. This was not her. This was not who she was.

*

Malum and Beami ate their food between stifled conversation. At least this was better than another row – something they had recently become expert in. They began arguments that referred to older arguments. There was immediate context in the delivered insults, which inferred moments from the past. There were words used that brought to mind rooms and events, distant images from their increasingly broken relationship.

Tonight he was trying so hard to put aside his machismo, his posturing, his elaborate and competitive boasting. For once his mask was in some other room. In moments like this she could see her husband as she remembered him when they had first met: him articulate and genuine, but from herself: brief responses, mixed with pangs of dread. Eventually his gaze travelled across her body, as if she was some prize he couldn't win.

In a pause during the meal, she noticed him sip from a vial when he thought she wasn't looking. Some concoction brewed by that witch?

Matters moved on to the semi-darkness of the bedroom, where he began his ritualistic attempt at making love – while guilt ravaged her – his body silhouetted against coloured lanterns. 'I reckon I can do it tonight,' he breathed in her ear.

He removed her clothing in the usual fashion – nothing new here – first lifting her outer garments off quickly, then getting down to her underwear. He kissed her neck: stubble on her skin. Her own guilt and his predictability soon removed any sense of excitement.

She closed her eyes and thought of Lupus.