When Vishous and Phury crossed over to the other side together, they took form in a white courtyard surrounded by a white arcade of Corinthian columns. In the center was a white marble fountain that splashed crystal clear water into a deep white cistern. In the far corner, on a white tree with white blossoms, a flock of rainbow-colored songbirds was gathered as if they'd been sprinkled on top of a cupcake. The sweet calls of the finches and the chickadees harmonized with the chiming sound of the fountain, as if both cadences were in the same key of joy.
"Warriors." The Scribe Virgin's voice came from behind V and made his skin pull like plastic over his bones. "Kneel and I shall greet you."
V ordered his knees to bend, and after a moment they hinged like rusty legs on a card table. Phury, on the other hand, didn't seem to be suffering from a case of the stiffs and went down smoothly.
Then again, he wasn't hitting the floor in front of a mother he despised.
"Phury, son of Ahgony, how fare thee?"
In a perfectly eloquent voice, the brother replied in the Old Language, "I fare well, for I am before thee with purity of devotion and depth of heart."
The Scribe Virgin chuckled. "A proper greeting in the proper way. Lovely of you. And surely more than I will get from my son."
V felt rather than saw Phury's head whip toward him. Oh, sorry, V thought. Guess I forgot to mention that happy little fact, my brother.
The Scribe Virgin drifted closer. "Ah, so my son has not told you his maternal lineage? Out of decorum, I wonder? Concern for upsetting the generally held principle of my so-called virginal existence? Yes, that is why, is it not, Vishous, son of the Bloodletter."
V lifted his eyes, though he hadn't been invited to. "Or maybe I just refuse to acknowledge you."
It was exactly what she expected him to say, and he could sense this not from reading her thoughts, but because on some level the two of them were one and the same, indivisible in spite of the air and space between them.
Yay.
"Your reticence to concede my maternity of you changes nothing," she said in a hard tone. "A book unopened alters not the ink on its pages. What is there is there."
Without permission, V stood and met his mother's hooded face, eye for eye, strength for strength.
Phury was no doubt blanching white as flour, but whatever. He'd match the decor that way. Besides, the Scribe Virgin wasn't going to toast her future Primale or her precious little boy. No way. So he didn't give a fuck.
"Let's get this over with, Mom. I want back to my real life¡ª"
V found himself flat on his back and not breathing in the blink of an eye. Though there was nothing on top of him and his body didn't seem to be compressed, he felt like he had a grand piano on his chest.
As his eyes bugged out and he fought to drag some air into his lungs, the Scribe Virgin floated over to him. Her hood lifted from her face of its own volition, and she stared down at him with a bored expression on her ghostly, glowing face.
"I would have your word that you will comport yourself with respect toward me whilst we are before my assembled Chosen. I concede that you have some liberties by definition, but I will not hesitate to determine you a worse future than the one you wish to forsake if you reveal them in public. Are we in agreement?"
Agreement? Agreement? Yeah, right, that kind of shit presupposed free will, and from everything he'd learned over the course of his life, it was clear he had none.
Fuck. Her.
Vishous exhaled slowly. Relaxed his muscles. And embraced the suffocation.
He held her stare... as he began to die.
After about a minute into the self-imposed drowning, his autonomic nervous system kicked in, his lungs punching against his chest walls, trying to drag down some oxygen. He locked his molars, pressed his lips together, and tightened his throat so that the draw reflex was rendered impotent.
"Oh, Jesus," Phury said in a shaky voice.
The burn in V's lungs spread throughout his torso as his vision started to fuzz and his body shook in the battle between mental will and the biological imperative to breathe. Eventually the war became less a fuck-you to his mother and more a fight to gain what he wanted: peace. Without Jane in his life, death was really his only option.
He began to black out.
All at once the nonexistent weight was lifted; then air shot through his nose and into his lungs sure as if it were a solid and an invisible hand had shoved the shit into him.
His body took over, hammering back his self-control. Against his will he sucked in oxygen like it was water, curling over on his side, breathing in great drafts, his vision gradually clearing until he could focus on the hem of his mother's robes.
When he finally peeled his face off the white floor and looked up at her, she was no longer the bright form he was used to. She had dulled, as if her glow were on a dimmer switch and someone was trying to pull off mood lighting.
Her face was the same, though. Translucent and beautiful and hard as a diamond.
"Shall we proceed in for the presentation?" she said. "Or perhaps you would like to receive your mate lying prostrate on my marble?"
V sat up, dizzy but not caring if he passed the fuck out. He supposed he should feel some kind of triumph for winning the fight with her, but he didn't.
He glanced at Phury. The guy was freaked, his yellow eyes peeled like grapes, his skin sallow and pasty. He looked like he was standing in the middle of a gator pool wearing steaks for shoes.
Man, going by how his brother was handling this little family spat, V couldn't imagine the Chosen would deal any better with open conflict between him and his Joan Crawford mother-mare. And V might not have any affinity for that bunch of females, but there was no reason to rile them up.
He got to his feet, and Phury stepped in at just the right time. As V listed to one side, the brother caught him under the armpit and steadied him.
"You will follow me now." The Scribe Virgin led the way to the arcade, floating above the marble, making neither sound nor any particular movement, a tiny apparition of solid form.
The three of them proceeded down the colonnade to a pair of gold doors V had never been through before. The things were massive and marked with an early version of the Old Language, one that bore enough relation to the current written symbology that V could translate:
Behold the sanctuary of the Chosen, sacred domain of the Race's past, present and future.
The doors opened unhanded, revealing a pastoral splendor that under other circumstances might have calmed the shit out of even V. Except for the fact that everything was white, it could have been any Ivy League-type college campus, the buildings Georgian-formal and spread out widely amidst rolling, milky grass and albino oak and elm trees.
A runner of white silk had been stretched out, and he and Phury walked on it while the Scribe Virgin ghosted along about a foot above the thing. The air was at the perfect temperature and so absolutely calm there was no sensation of it passing over exposed skin. Although gravity still held V down, he felt lighter and somewhat buoyant... as if, with a running start, he could go bounding off across the lawn like those pictures of men on the moon.
Or, shit, maybe this lunar-walk sensation was because he had some brain-fry going on.
When they crested a hill, an amphitheater was revealed down below. As were the Chosen.
Oh, Jesus . . . The forty or so females were dressed in identical white robes with their hair up and their hands gloved. Their coloring varied from blond to brunette to redhead, yet they seemed to be all the same person because of their long, lean builds and those matching robes. Split into two groups, they lined either side of the amphitheater, presenting themselves at a three-quarter turn with their right feet out slightly. They reminded him of the caryatids of Roman architecture, those sculptures of females that supported pediments or roofs on their regal heads.
Staring at them now, he wondered whether they had hearts that beat and lungs that pumped. Because they were as still as the air.
See, this was the problem with the Other Side, he thought. Nothing ever moved here. There was life... without life.
"Come forward," the Scribe Virgin commanded. "The presentation awaits."
Oh... God ... He couldn't breathe again.
Phury's hand landed on his shoulder. "You need a minute?"
Fuck a minute; he needed centuries¡ªalthough even assuming he had that kind of time, it wasn't going to change the outcome. With a sense of destiny, he pictured that civilian vampire he'd found in the alley, the one who he'd come upon that night he'd been shot, the one who he'd killed that lesser to avenge.
They needed more in the Brotherhood, he thought as he started to walk again. And it wasn't like the stork was going to get the job done.
Down in front there was only one seat in the house, a golden thronelike production that was positioned up close to the lip of the amphitheater's stage. From this vantage point, he realized that what he'd assumed was a blank white wall at the back was really a vast white velvet curtain that hung down as motionless as if it had been painted on a mural.
"You. Sit," the Scribe Virgin said to him, obviously beyond sick of his ass.
Funny, he felt the same way about her.
V planted it as Phury took root like a tree behind the throne.
The Scribe Virgin floated over to the right, assuming a position at the side of the stage, a Shakespearean director, the driver of all the drama.
Man, what he wouldn't give for an asp right about now.
"Proceed," she called out in a clipped voice.
The curtain split down the middle and retracted, revealing a female covered in jeweled robes from head to foot. Flanked by two Chosen, his intended seemed to be standing at an odd angle. Or maybe she wasn't standing. Jesus, it appeared as though she was on some kind of slab that had been tilted upright for viewing. Like a butterfly mounted.
As she was rolled forward, it became clear that she was in fact fixed on something. There were bands around her upper arms, ones that were camouflaged with jewels to match her robes, ones that appeared to be holding her up.
Must be part of the ceremony. Because what was under that robe was not only prepared for this presentation and the mating ritual that would follow, but no doubt was psyched as hell to be the number one female: The Primale's first Chosen had special rights, and he could only imagine what a rocking good time that would be for her.
Even though it might not be fair, he resented the hell out of what was under that splendor.
The Scribe Virgin nodded, and the Chosen to the left and the right of his intended started to undo the robing. As they went to work, a rush of energy rippled through the stillness of the amphitheater, the culmination of decades of the Chosen waiting for the old ways to start up again.
V watched with no care whatsoever as the jeweled robes were pulled back to reveal a stunningly beautiful female form draped in a gossamer-thin sheath. His intended's face was kept hooded, according to tradition, for it was not her that was being given but all of the Chosen.
"Is she to your liking?" the Scribe Virgin asked dryly, as if she knew that the female was utter perfection.
"Whatever."
A murmur of disquiet went through the Chosen, a chilly breeze through stiff reeds.
"Perhaps you shall choose your words anew?" the Scribe Virgin snapped.
"She'll do."
After an awkward pause, a Chosen came forward with an incense burner and a white feather. As she chanted, she wafted smoke over the female from hooded head to bare feet, going around once for the past, once for the present, once for the future.
As the ritual progressed, V frowned and leaned forward. The front of his intended's gossamer-thin sheath was wet.
Probably oils from when she'd been prepared for him.
He eased back in the throne. Shit, he hated the ancient ways. Hated this whole fucking thing.
Underneath the hood, Cormia was in a state of desperation. The air she breathed was hot and wet and smothering, worse in that regard than having nothing at all to inhale. Her knees were loose as blades of grass, her palms wringing wet. If not for the restraints, she would have crumpled.
Following her panicked bid for escape in the baths, and her eventual capture, a bitter drink had been forced down her throat at the Directrix's command. It had calmed her for a time, but the elixir was now wearing weak, and her fear was spiking once again.
As was the degradation. When she'd felt hands going down the front of the robing to free the golden toggles, she'd wept for the violation of a stranger's gaze upon her private skin. Then the two heavy halves of the robe had been pulled apart from her body and she'd felt coolness on her skin, something that was in no way a relief from the weight of what had been draped all over her.
The Primale's eyes had been upon her as the Scribe Virgin's voice had called out: "Is she to your liking?"
Cormia had waited for the Brother's response, praying for some warmth within it.
There was absolutely none: "Whatever."
"Perhaps you shall choose your words anew?"
"She'll do."
Upon hearing the words, Cormia's heart stopped beating, fear replaced by terror. Vishous, son of the Bloodletter, had a cold voice, one that suggested proclivities far worse than even his father's reputation had detailed.
How would she survive the mating, much less represent well the venerable Chosen during the course of it? In the bath, the Directrix had been brutal in her wording of all that Cormia would disgrace if she did not comport herself with appropriate dignity. If she didn't carry out her responsibility. If she was not the proper representative of the whole.
How could she bear this all?
Cormia heard the Scribe Virgin speak again: "Vishous, your stead has not tendered his gaze. Phury, son of Ahgony, you must view the Chosen that is offered as the Primale's witness."
Cormia trembled, afeared of yet another set of unknown male eyes upon her form. She felt unclean though she had been so carefully washed; dirty, though no filth dripped from her. Under the hood she wished she were small, so small she would shame the head of a pin.
For if she were small, their eyes wouldn't find her. If she were tiny, she could hide amongst larger things... disappear from all of this.
Phury's eyes were glued to the back of the golden throne, and he really didn't want them anywhere else. This whole thing was wrong. All wrong.
"Phury, son of Ahgony?" The Scribe Virgin pronounced his father's name as if the weight of the family's entire lineage rested on whether Phury got with the program.
He flipped his lids up to the female¡ª
Every one of his mental processes ground to a halt.
His body was what responded. Instantly. He thickened in his silk pants, his erection popping up fast as a breath even as he was utterly ashamed of himself. How could he be so cruel? He dropped his lids, crossed his arms over his chest, and tried to figure out how he could manage to kick his own ass and still remain standing.
"How find you her, warrior?"
"Resplendent." The word came out of his mouth from nowhere. Then he added, "Worth of the fairest tradition of the Chosen."
"Ah, now, that is the proper response. As acceptance has been made, I pronounce this female as the Primale's selection. Complete the incense bathing."
In his peripheral vision, Phury was aware of two Chosen coming out with staffs that had smoky white trails drifting from them. As they began to sing in high, crystal voices, he breathed in deep, sifting through a garden's bloom of female scents.
He found the intended's. Had to be hers, because it was the only one in the whole place that was spelling out pure terror¡ª
"Stop the ceremony," V said in a hard voice.
The Scribe Virgin's head twisted over to him. "They shall finish it."
"The hell they will." The brother got up out of his throne and marched onto the stage, having obviously caught the scent as well. As he came forward, the Chosen let out squeaks of alarm and broke ranks. While the females scattered and their white robes whipped around, Phury thought of a stack of paper napkins at a picnic, blowing away all willy-nilly, skipping along the grass.
Except this was no Sunday in the park.
Vishous yanked the intended's jeweled robing back together, then tore free the binds. As she sagged, he caught her by the arm and held her up. "Phury, I'll meet you back home."
Wind began to rip around, emanating from the Scribe Virgin, but V held his own, facing off with his... well, his mother, apparently.
Mother, Christ, never saw that one coming.
V had a death grip on the poor female and a face full of hatred as he stared at the Scribe Virgin. "Phury, get the fuck out of here."
Even though Phury was a peacekeeper at heart, he knew better than to intercede in this kind of family squabble. The best he could to was pray his brother didn't come back in an urn.
Before he took off, he had one last look at the female's hooded form. V was now holding her with both hands, as she appeared to have passed out. Jesus Christ... What a mess.
Phury turned and beat feet back down the white silk runner toward the Scribe Virgin's Courtyard. First stop? Wrath's study. The king was going to have to know what went down. Even though clearly the biggest part of the story had yet to play out.