Imajica 02 - The Reconciliator

22

Gentle wasn't the only occupant of the house in Gamut Street who'd smelled the In Ovo on the late-afternoon breeze; so had one who'd once been a prisoner in that Hell between Dominions: Little Ease. When Gentle returned to the Meditation Room, having set Monday the task of bringing the stones up the stairs and sent Clem around the house securing it, he found his sometime tormentor up at the window. There were tears on its cheeks, and its teeth were chattering uncontrollably.

"He's coming, isn't he?" it said. "Did you see him, Liberatore?"

"Yes, he is, and no, I didn't," Gentle said. "Don't look so terrified, Easy. I'm not going to let him lay a finger on you."

The creature put on its wretched grin, but with its teeth in such motion the effect was grotesque.

"You sound like my mother," it said. "Every night she used to tell me: nothing's going to hurt you, nothing's going to hurt you."

"I remind you of your mother?"

"Give or take a tit," Little Ease replied. "She was no beauty, it has to be said. But all my fathers loved her."

There was a din from downstairs, and the creature jumped.

"It's all right," Gentle said. "It's just Clem closing the shutters."

"I want to be of some use. What can I do?"

"You can do what you're doing. Watch the street. If you see anything out there—"

"I know. Scream blue murder."

With the windows shuttered below, the house was thrown into a sudden dusk, in which Clem, Monday, and Gentle labored without word or pause. By the time all the stones had been fetched upstairs the day outside had also dwindled into twilight, and Gentle found Little Ease leaning out of the window, stripping fistfuls of leaves from the tree outside and flinging them back into the room. When he asked it what it was up to it explained that, with evening fallen, the street was invisible through the foliage, so it was clearing it away.

"When T begin the Reconciliation maybe you should keep watch from the floor above," Gentle suggested.

"Whatever you suggest, Liberatore," Little Ease said. It slid down from the sill and stared up at him. "But before I go, if you don't mind, I have a little request," it said.

"Yes?"

"It's delicate."

"Don't be afraid. Ask it."

"I know you're about to start the working, and I think this may be the last time I have the honor of your company. When the Reconciliation's achieved you'll be a great man. I don't mean to say you're not one already," it added hurriedly. "You are, of course. But after tonight everyone will know you're the Reconciler, and you did what Christos Himself couldn't do. You'll be made Pope, and you'll write your memoirs"—Gentle laughed—"and I'll never see you again. And that's as it should be. That's right and proper. But before you become hopelessly famous and feted, I wondered: would you .., bless me?"

"Bless you?"

Little Ease raised its long—fingered hands to ward off the rejection it thought was coming. "I understand! I understand!" it said. "You've already been kind to me beyond measure—"

"It's not that," said Gentle, going down on his haunches in front of the creature the way he had when its head had been beneath Jude's heel. "I'd do it if I could. But Ease, I don't know how. I'm not a Messiah. I've never had a ministry. I've never preached a gospel or raised the dead."

"You've got your disciples," Little Ease said.

"No. I've had some friends who've endured me, and some mistresses who've humored me. But I've never had the power to inspire. I frittered it away on seductions. I don't have the right to bless anybody. — "

"I'm sorry," the creature said. "I won't mention it again."

Then it did again what it had done when Gentle had set it free: took his hand and laid its brow upon his palm.

"I'm ready to die for you, Liberatore."

"I'm hoping that won't be necessary."

Little Ease looked up. "Between us?" it said. "So am I."

Its oath made, it returned to gathering up the leaves it had deposited on the floor, putting plugs of them up its nose to stop the stench. But Gentle told it to let the rest lie. The scent of the sap was sweeter than the smell that would permeate the house if, or rather when, Sartori arrived. At the mention of the enemy, Little Ease hoisted itself back up onto the sill.

"Any sign?" Gentle asked it.

"Not that I see."

"But what do you feel?"

"Ah," it said, looking up through the canopy of leaves. "It's such a beautiful night, Liberatore. But he's going to try and spoil it."

"I think you're right. Stay here a while longer, will you? I want to go around the house with Clem. If you see anything—"

"They'll hear me in L'Himby," Ease promised.

The beast was as good as its word. Gentle hadn't reached the bottom of the stairs when it set up a din so loud it brought dust from the rafters. Yelling for Monday and Clem to make sure all the doors were bolted, Gentle started up the stairs again, reaching the summit in time to see the door of the Meditation Room flung open and Little Ease backing through it at speed, shrieking. Whatever warning the creature was trying to offer, it was incomprehensible.

Gentle didn't try and interpret it, but raced towards the room, drawing his breath in readiness to drive Sartori's invaders out. The window was empty when he entered, but the circle was not. Within the ring of stones two forms were unknotting themselves. He'd never seen the phenomenon of passage from this perspective before, and he stood as much aghast as awed. There were too many raw surfaces in this process for comfortable viewing. But he studied the forms with mounting excitement, certain long before they were reconstituted that one of the travelers was Jude. The other, when she appeared, was a cross—eyed girl of seventeen or so, who fell to her knees sobbing with terror and relief the moment her muscles were her own again. Even Jude, who'd made this journey four times now, was shaking violently and would have fallen when she stepped from the circle had Gentle not caught her up.

"The In Ovo..." she gasped, "almost had us...."

Her leg had been gouged from knee to ankle.

"... felt teeth in me...."

"You're all right," Gentle said. "You've still got two legs. Clem! Clem!"

He was already at the door, with Monday in pursuit.

"Have we got something to bind this up?"

"Of course! I'll go—"

"No," said Jude. "Take me down. This is no floor to bleed on."

Monday was left to comfort Hoi—Polloi, while Clem and Gentle carried Jude to the door.

"I've never seen the In Ovo like that before," she said. "Crazy...."

"Sartori's been in," Gentle said, "finding himself an army."

"He certainly stirred them up."

"We were about to give up on you," Clem said.

Jude raised her head. Her skin was waxen with shock, and her smile too tentative to be joyful. But it was there, at least.

"Never give up on the messenger," she said. "Especially if she's got good news."

It was three hours and four minutes to midnight, and there wasn't time for a lengthy exchange, but Gentle wanted some explanation—however brief—of what had taken Jude to Yzordderrex. So she was made comfortable in the front room, which Monday's scavengings had furnished with pillows, foodstuffs, and even magazines, and there, while Clem bound her leg and foot, she did her best to encapsulate all that had happened to her since she'd left the Retreat.

It didn't make easy telling, and there were a couple of occasions when she attempted to describe scenes in Yzordderrex and simply gave up, saying that she knew no words to describe what she'd witnessed and felt. Gentle listened without once interrupting her, though his expression grew grimmer when she told of how Uma Umagammagi had passed through the Dominions, seeking out the Synod to be certain their motives were pure.

When she was finished he said, "I was in Yzordderrex too. It's changed quite a bit,"

"For the better," Jude said.

"I don't like ruin, however picturesque it is," Gentle replied.

Jude eyed him strangely at this, but she said nothing.

"Are we safe here?" Hoi—Polloi said, addressing nobody in particular. "It's so dark."

"Course we're safe," Monday said, putting his arm around the girl's shoulders. "We got the whole fuckin' place sealed up. He's not going to get in, is he, boss?"

"Who?" Jude asked.

"Sartori," said Monday.

"Is he somewhere in the vicinity?"

Gentle's silence was reply enough.

"And you think a few locks are going to keep him out?"

"Won't they?" said Hoi—Polloi.

"Not if he wants to get in," Jude said.

"He won't," Gentle replied. "When the Reconciliation begins, there's going to be a flow of power through this house ... my Father's power."

The thought was as distasteful to Jude as Gentle assumed it would be to Sartori, but her response was subtler than revulsion.

"He's your brother," she reminded him, "Don't be so sure he won't want a taste of what's in here. And if he does, he'll come and get it."

He stared hard at her.

"Are we talking about power, here, or you?"

Jude took a moment before replying. Then she said, "Both."

Gentle shrugged. "If that happens, you'll make your decision," he said. "You've made them before, and you've been wrong. Maybe it's time to have a little faith, Jude." He stood up. "Share what the rest of us already know," he said.

"And what's that?"

"That in a few hours we'll be standing in a legendary place."

Monday softly said, "Yeah," and Gentle smiled.

"Take care down here, all of you," he said, and headed to the door.

Jude reached for Clem, and with his help hauled herself to her feet. By the time she reached the door Gentle was already on the stairs.

She didn't say his name. He simply stopped for a moment and, without turning, said, "I don't want to hear."

Then he continued his ascent, and she knew by the slope of his shoulders and the weight of his tread that for all his prophetic talk there was a little worm of doubt in him just as there was in her, and he was afraid that if he turned and saw her, it would fatten on their look and choke him.

The scent of sap was waiting for him on the threshold, and as he'd hoped it masked the sourer smell from the darkened streets outside. Otherwise his room, in which he'd lounged and laughed and debated the conundrums of the cosmos, offered no solace. It suddenly seemed to him a stagnant place, too well feited and swayed for its own good: the last place on earth to perform his work. But then hadn't he berated Jude, just moments ago, for not having sufficient faith? There was no great power in geography. It was all rooted in the Maestro's faith in the miraculous, and in the will that sprang from that faith.

In preparation for the work ahead, he undressed. Once naked, he crossed to the mantelpiece, intending to fetch the candles off it and set them around the circle. But the sight of their flames in flickering array made him think instead of worship, and he dropped to his knees in front of the empty grate to pray. The Lord's Prayer came most readily to his lips, and he recited it aloud. Its sentiments had never been apter, of course. But after tonight it would be a museum piece, a relic of a time before the Lord's Kingdom had come and His will been done, on Earth and in Heaven.

A touch on the back of his neck brought this recitation to a halt. He opened his eyes, raised his head, turned. The room was empty, but his nape still tingled where the touch had come. This wasn't memory, he knew. It was something more delicate than that, a reminder of the other prize that lay at the end of this night's work. Not glory, not the gratitude of the Dominions: Pie 'oh' pah. He looked up at the stained wall above the mantelpiece and seemed for a moment to see the mystif s face there, changing with each flicker of the candlelight. Athanasius had called the love he felt for the mystif profane. He hadn't believed it then, and he didn't now. The purpose that was in him as Reconciler and the desire he felt for reunion were part of the same plan.

The prayer was gone from his tongue. No matter, he thought; I'm its executor now. He got up, took one of the candles from the mantelpiece, and, smiling, stepped over the perimeters of the circle, not as a simple traveler but as a Maestro, ready to use its engine to miraculous end.

Lying on the cushions in the lounge below, Jude felt the flow of energies start. They ached in her chest and belly, like mild dyspepsia. She rubbed her stomach, in the hope of soothing the discomfort, but it did little good, so she got to her feet and hobbled out, leaving Monday to entertain HoiPolloi with his chatter and his handiwork. He'd taken to drawing on the walls with the smoke from one of the candles, enhancing the marks with his chalks. Hoi—Polloi was much impressed, and her laughter, the first Jude had ever heard from the girl, followed her out into the hallway, where she found Clem standing guard beside the locked front door.

They stared at each other in the candlelight for several seconds before she said, "Do you feel it too?"

"Yep. It's not very pleasant, is it?"

"I thought it was only me," she said.

"Why only you?"

"I don't know, some kind of punishment...."

"You still think he's got some secret agenda, don't you?"

"No," Jude said, glancing up the stairs. "I think he's doing what he believes is best. In fact I know it. Uma Umagammagi got inside his head—"

"God, he hated that."

"She gave him a good report, whether he hated it or not."

"So?"

"So there's still a conspiracy somewhere."

"Sartori?"

"No. It's something to do with their Father and this damn Reconciliation." She winced as the discomfort in her belly became more severe. "I'm not afraid of Sartori. It's what's going on in this house"—she gritted her teeth as another wave of pain passed through her system—"that I can't quite trust."

She looked back at Clem and knew that, as ever, he'd listen as a loving friend, but she could expect no support from him. He and Tay were the angels of the Reconciliation, and if she pressed them to decide between her welfare and that of the working, she'd be the loser.

The sound of Hoi—Polloi's laughter came again, not as feathery as before, but with an undertow of mischief Jude knew was sexual. She turned her back on the sound and on Clem, and her gaze came to rest on the door of the one room in this house she'd never entered. It stood a little ajar, and she could see that candles were burning inside. Of all the company to seek out when she was in need of comfort, Celestine's was the least promising, but all other avenues were closed to her. She crossed to the door and pushed it open. The mattress was empty, and the candle beside it was burning low. The room was too large to be illuminated by such a fitful flame, and she had to study the darkness until she found its occupant. Celestine was standing against the far wall.

"I'm surprised you came back," she said.

Jude had heard many exquisite speakers since she'd last heard Celestine, but there was still something extraordinary in the way the woman mingled voices: one running beneath the other, as though the part of her touched by divinity had never entirely married with a baser self.

"Why surprised?"

"Because I thought you'd stay with the Goddesses."

"I was tempted," Jude replied.

"But finally you had to come back. For him."

"I was a messenger, that's all. I've got no claims on Gentle now."

"I didn't mean Gentle."

"I see."

"I meant—"

"I know who you meant."

"Can't you bear to have his name spoken?"

Celestine had been staring at the candle flame, but now she looked up at Jude.

"What will you do when he's dead?" she asked. "He will die, you realize that? He has to. Gentle'11 want to be magnanimous, the way .victors are supposed to be; he'll want to forgive all his brother's trespasses. But there'll be too many demands for his head."

Until now Jude hadn't contemplated the possibility of Sartori's demise. Even in the tower, knowing Gentle had gone in pursuit of his brother intending to stop his malice, she'd never believed he'd die. But what Celestine said was undoubtedly true. There were countless claims upon his head, both secular and divine. Even if Gentle was forgiving, Jokataytau wouldn't be; nor would the Unbeheld.

"You're very alike, you know, you and he," Celestine said. "Both copies of a finer original."

"You never knew Quaisoir," Jude replied. "You don't know whether she was finer or not."

"Copies are always coarser. It's their nature. But at least your instinct's good. You and he belong together. That's what you're pining for, isn't it? Why don't you admit it?"

"Why should I pour out my heart to you?"

"Isn't that what you came in here to do? You won't get any sympathy out there."

"Listening by the door now?"

"I've heard everything that's gone on in this house since I was brought here. And what I haven't heard, I've felt. And what I haven't felt, I've predicted."

"Like what?"

"Well, for one thing that child Monday will end up coupling with the little virgin you brought back from Yzordderrex."

"That scarcely takes an oracle."

"And the Oviate isn't long for this world."

"The Oviate?"

"It calls itself Little Ease. The beast you had under your heel. It asked the Maestro to bless it a little while ago. It'll murder itself before daybreak."

"Why would it do that?"

"It knows when Sartori perishes it'll be forfeit too, however much allegiance it's sworn to the winning side. It's sensible. It wants to choose its moment."

"Am I supposed to find some lesson in that?"

"I don't think you're capable of suicide," Celestine said.

"You're right. I've got too much to live for."

"Motherhood?"

"And the future. There's going to be a change in this city. I've seen it in Yzordderrex already. The waters will rise—"

"—and the great sisterhood will dispense love from on high."

"Why not? Clem told me what happened when the Goddess came. You were in ecstasies, so don't try and deny it."

"Maybe I was. But do you imagine that's going to make you and me sisters? What have we got in common, besides our sex?"

The question was meant to sting, but its plainness made Jude see the questioner with fresh eyes. Why was Celestine so eager to deny any other link between them but womanhood? Because another such link existed, and it was at the very heart of their enmity. Nor, now that Celestine's contempt had freed Jude from reverence, was it difficult to see where their stories intersected. From the beginning, Celestine had marked Jude out as a woman who stank of coitus. Why? Because she too stank of coitus. And this business with the child, which came up again and again: that had the same root. Celestine had also borne a baby for this dynasty of Gods and demigods. She too had been used and had never quite come to terms with the fact. When she raged against Jude, the tainted woman who would not concede her error in being sexual, in being fecund, she was raging against some fault in herself.

And the nature of that fault? It wasn't difficult to guess, or to put words to. Celestine had asked a plain question. Now it was Jude's turn.

"Was it really rape?" she said.

Celestine glanced up, her look venomous. The denial that followed, however, was measured. "I'm afraid I don't know what you mean," she said.

"Well, now," Jude replied, "how else can I put it?" She paused. "Did Sartori's Father take you against your will?"

The other woman now put on a show of comprehension, followed by one of shock.

"Of course He did," she said. "How could you ask such a thing?"

"But you knew where you were going, didn't you? I realize Dowd drugged you at the start, but you weren't in a coma all the way across the Dominions. You knew something extraordinary was waiting at the end of the trip."

"I don't—"

"Remember? Yes, you do. You remember every mile of it. And I don't think Dowd kept his mouth shut all those weeks. He was pimping for God, and he was proud of it Wasn't he?"

Celestine offered no riposte. She simply stared at Jude, daring her to go on, which Jude was happy to do.

"So he told you what lay ahead, didn't he? He said that you were going to the Holy City and you were going to see the Unbeheld Himself. Not just see Him but be loved by Him. And you were flattered,"

"It wasn't like that."

"How was it then? Did He have His angels hold you down while He did the deed? No, I don't think so. You lay there and you let Him do what the hell He wanted, because it was going to make you into the bride of God and the mother of Christ—"

"Stop!"

"If I'm wrong, tell me how it was. Tell me you screamed and fought and tried to tear out His eyes."

Celestine continued to stare, but said nothing.

"That's why you despise me, isn't it?" Jude went on. "That's why I'm the woman who stinks of coitus. Because I lay down with a piece of the same God that you did, and you don't like to be reminded of the fact."

"Don't judge me, woman!" Celestine suddenly shouted.

"Then don't you judge me! Woman. I did what I wanted with the man I wanted, and I'm carrying the consequences. You did the same. I'm not ashamed of it. You are. That's why we're not sisters, Celestine."

She'd said her piece, and she wasn't much interested in a further round of insults and denials, so she turned her back and had her hand on the door when Celestine spoke. There were no denials. She spoke softly, half lost to memory.

"It was a city of iniquities," she said. "But how was I to know that? I thought I was blessed among women, to have been chosen. To be God's—"

"Bride?" Jude said, turning back from the door.

"That's a kind word," Celestine said. "Yes. Bride." She drew a deep breath. "I never even saw my husband."

"What did you see?"

"Nobody. The city was full, I know it was full, I saw shadows at the window, I saw them close up the doors when I passed, but nobody showed their faces."

"Were you afraid?"

"No. It was too beautiful. The stones were full of light, and the houses were so high you could barely see the sky. It was like nothing I'd ever seen. And I walked, and I walked, and I kept thinking, He'll send an angel for me soon, and I'll be carried to His palace. But there were no angels. There was just the city, going on and on in every direction, and I got tired after a time. I sat down, just to rest for a few minutes, and I fell asleep."

"You fell asleep?"

"Yes. Imagine! I was in the City of God, and I fell asleep. And I dreamed I was back at Tyburn, where Dowd had found me. I was watching a man being hanged, and I dug through the crowd until I was standing under the gallows." She raised her head. "I remember looking up at him, kicking at the end of his rope. His breeches were unbuttoned, and his rod was poking out."

The look on her face was all disgust, but she drove herself on to finish the story.

"And I lay down under him. I lay down in the dirt in front of all these people, with him kicking, and his rod getting redder and redder. And as he died he spilled his seed. I wanted to get up before it touched me, but my legs were open, and it was too late. Down it came. Not much. Just a few spurts. But I felt every drop inside me like a little fire, and I wanted to cry out. But I didn't, because that was when I heard the voice." .

"What voice?"

"It was in the ground underneath me. Whispering."

"What did it say?"

"The same thing, over and over again: Nisi Nirvana, Nisi Nirvana. Nisi... Nirvana."

In the process of repeating the words, tears began to flow copiously. She made no attempt to stem them, but the repetition faltered.

"Was it Hapexamendios talking to you?" Jude asked.

Celestine shook her head. "Why should) He speak to me? He had what He needed. I'd lain down and dreamed while He dropped His seed. He was already gone, back to His angels."

"So who was it?"

"I don't know. I've thought about it over and over. I even made it into a story, to tell the child, so that when I'd gone he'd have the mystery for himself. But I don't think I ever really wanted to know. I was afraid my heart would burst if I ever knew the answer. I was afraid the heart of the world would burst."

She looked up at Jude.

"So now you know my shame," she said.

"I know your story," said Jude. "But I don't see any reason for shame."

Her own tears, which she'd been holding back since Celestine had begun to share this horror with her, fell now, flowing a little for the pain she felt and a little for the doubt that still churned in her, but mostly for the smile that came onto Celestine's face when she heard Jude's reply, and for the sight of the other woman opening her arms and crossing the room, to embrace her like a loved one who'd been lost and found again before some final fire.