Jirel of Joiry (24 page)

A rustle and a sigh from beyond brought her head up, and she stared around her in the shadows of the halls. In a broad, uneven circle the bodies of last night’s dancers lay sprawled.
Dead?
No, slow breathing stirred them as they lay, and upon the face of the nearest—it was
Damara
—was a look of such glutted satiety that
Jirel
glanced away in disgust. But they all shared it. She had seen revelers asleep after a night of drunken feasting with not half such surfeit, such almost obscene satisfaction upon their faces as Alaric’s drugged company wore now. Remembering that obscure lusting she had seen in their eyes last night, she wondered what nameless satiety they had achieved in the dark after her own consciousness went out…

A footfall sounded upon stone behind her and she spun half-way round, rising on one knee and shifting the knife-hilt firmer in her fist. It was Alaric, a little unsteady on his feet, looking down upon her with a sort of half-seeing abstraction. His scarlet tunic was dusty and rumpled as if he had slept in it all night upon the floor and had only just risen. He ran a hand through his ruffled hair and yawned, and looked down at her with a visible effort at focusing his attention.

“I’ll have your horse brought up,” he said, his eyes sliding indifferently away from her even as he spoke. “You may go now.”

Jirel
gaped up at him, her lips parting in amazement over white teeth. He was not watching her. His eyes had shifted focus and he was staring blindly into some delightful memory that had blotted out
Jirel’s
very existence. And upon his face that look of almost obscene satiety relaxed every feature until even his sword-gash mouth hung loose.

“B-but—”
Jirel
blinked and clutched at the mildewed box she had risked her life for. He came back into focus for an impatient instant to say carelessly: “Oh—that! Take the thing.”

“You—you know what it is? I thought you wanted—”

He shrugged. “I could not have explained to you last night what it was I wanted of—
Andred
. So I said it was the treasure we sought—you could understand that. But as for that rotting little box—I don’t know or care what lies inside. I’ve had—a better thing.…” And his remembering eyes shifted again to escape hers and stare blissfully into the past.

“Then why did you—save me?”

“Save you?” He laughed. “We had no thought of you or your treasure in what we—did—last night. You have served your purpose—you may go free.”

“Served—what purpose?”

Impatiently for an instant he brought himself wholly back out of his remembering dream to say: “You did what we were holding you for—called up
Andred
into our power. Lucky for you that the dogs sensed what happened after you had slipped off to dare the ghost alone.
And lucky for us, too.
I think
Andred
might not have come even to take you, had he sensed our presence. Make no doubt of it—he feared us, and with good reason.”

Jirel
looked up at him for a long instant, a little chill creeping down her spine, before she said in a shaken whisper:

“What—are you?” And for a moment she almost hoped he would not answer. But he smiled, and the look of deformity deepened upon his face.

“A hunter of
undeath
,” he said softly. “A drinker of
undeath
, when I can find it.… My people and I lust after that dark force which the ghosts of the violent dead engender, and we travel far sometimes between—feastings.” His eyes escaped hers for an instant to stare gloatingly into the past. Still looking with that unfocused gaze, in a voice she had not heard before from him, he murmured, “I wonder if any man who has not tasted it could guess the utter ecstasy of drinking up the
undeath
of a strong ghost… a ghost as strong as
Andred’s
… feeling that black power pouring into you in deep drafts as you suck it down—a thirst that strengthens as you drink—feel—darkness—spreading through every vein more sweetly than wine, more intoxicating…
To be drunk on
undeath
—a joy almost unbearable.”

Watching him,
Jirel
was aware of a strong shudder that rose in the pit of her stomach and ran strongly and
shakingly
along her limbs. With an effort she tore her gaze away. The obscene ecstasy that Alaric’s inward-looking eyes dwelt upon was a thing she would not see even in retrospect, through another’s words and eyes. She scrambled to her feet, cradling the leather box in her arm, averting her eyes from his.

“Let me go, then,” she said in a lowered voice, obscurely embarrassed as if she had looked inadvertently upon something indescribable. Alaric glanced up at her and smiled.

“You are free to go,” he said, “but waste no time returning with your men for vengeance against the force we imposed on you.” His smile deepened at her little twitch of acknowledgment, for that thought had been in her mind. “Nothing holds us now at
Hellsgarde
. We will leave today on—another search. One thing before you go—we owe you a debt for luring
Andred
into our power, for I think he would not have come without you. Take a warning away with you, lady.”

“What is it?”
Jirel’s
gaze flicked the man’s briefly and fell again. She would not look into his eyes if she could help it. “What warning?”

“Do not open that box you carry.”

And before she could get her breath to speak he had smiled at her and turned away, whistling for his men. Around her on the floor
Jirel
heard a rustling and a sigh as the sleepers began to stir. She stood quiet for an instant longer, staring down in bewilderment at the small box under her arm, before she turned to follow Alaric into the outer air.

Last night was a memory and a nightmare to forget. Not even the dead men still on their ghastly guard before the door could mar her triumph now.

Jirel
rode back across the causeway in the strong light of morning, moving like a rider in a mirage between blue skies and blue reflecting waters. Behind her
Hellsgarde
Castle was a vision swimming among the mirroring pools of the marsh. And as she rode, she remembered.

The vortex of violence out of which she had snatched this box last night—the power and terror of the thing that had treasured it so long… what lay within?
Something akin to—
Andred
?
Alaric might not know, but he had guessed… His warning still sounded in her ears.

She rode awhile with bent brows, but presently a wicked little smile began to thin the red lips of
Joiry’s
sovereign lady. Well… she had suffered much for Guy of
Garlot
, but she thought now that she would not smash in his handsome, grinning face with her sword-hilt as she had dreamed so luxuriously of doing. No… she would have a better vengeance…

She would hand him a little iron-bound leather box.