I loathed her. The touch of her like thorns – worse, because I have been lacerated by thorns and borne it easily. Her eyes are full of something, maybe love, maybe only my reflection …
‘You are an illusion,’ crisply said Jemhara. ‘I will banish you.’
‘You are not an illusion,’ steadily said Thryfe. ‘I will keep you here.’
Between them was the inlaid table, gleaming in firelight, or from another source. The wine and apple and ring shone, three tinted moons, ruby, emerald, silver. On a wall a twig glimmered too, unnoted.
Jemhara drew back. She sat on the edge of the bed. ‘Please sit, Highness,’ she said.
Thryfe ignored the single chair. ‘I’ll remain as I am, Highness.’
‘How can you address me as a Magikoy?’ Her voice was very thin.
‘I think others have done so.’
‘They were wrong.’
‘I was wrong, in so much, until now. What shall I do, Jema, to put it right?’
‘Leave me,’ she said. ‘Go hurriedly away. That’s best.’
‘Then,’ he said.
‘Then nothing. I was foretold you’d come. By a devilish god. By Vashdran—’
‘A sun god, if his foretelling to me was real. I’ve never been sure. We can discuss it.’
‘Go away,’ she said.
He sighed. ‘I’d suppose you took your revenge on me, but I don’t think you so petty. What is it? Have I ruined it all, wounded you so deeply that all you feel now is the wound?’
A whisper. ‘All I feel is love.’
‘Oh, love. Love is always fearful. It sees its first object torn in shreds under a tree of ice by a black wolf. It sees the people it must protect dissolved to sand. It says, hang yourself, atone, suffer. That’s what love does. Is there nothing else?’
Her voice now was even less, a flake of tinsel dropped inside a cup. ‘Why did you leave the wine and fruit, the ring?’
‘I found the apple on my way here. In a derelict hothouse, the last single apple, all the rest black and rotten, but this one pristine and preserved in ice. The wine was frozen too in a goblet which had itself become ice. I lit your fire and let them thaw.’
‘And the ring …’
‘The ring. That was mine, when I was young. When I had a little money, in a city – then. Then I left it off. The display of Rukarian kings made me sick. So no adornment for proud Thryfe. I found it recently at my house near Stones, after you’d gone away. I was – drawn to it again, to my earlier self – innocent, unembarrassed to be happy. But I found too I can’t wear it now. My left hand’s turned partly to stone.’ He saw her start, glancing up with a firework of concern in her gaze. Oh, women. Women. He said, ‘You have my ring. I’ll go away now.’
‘Your hand—’
‘It’s nothing, and serves me right. It happened from the punishment I gave myself in the Insularia. That jail from which you rescued me at such cost to yourself.’
‘Perhaps,’ she said.
‘Perhaps,’ he said. ‘Perhaps come here, Jemhara. Perhaps come here and make certain I’m an illusion. Or a liar. Or a ghost. Or a lover. Could I be that? Come here, Jemhara.’
Exquisite, clad only in her body – bizarre to him as any garment from another earth – Jemhara rose. She crossed the room with slow, even steps. A few feet from him she halted. Thryfe, astonished, amused, aroused, reassured, felt his own clothing peel from him at the action of her will. He, now, naked as she. Jemhara laughed, her head tilted to one side.
‘Yes, my lord,’ she said, ‘this is you.’
I touch – I burn—
I burn – I touch—
Buy No Flame But Mine Now!
GLOSSARY
Bedfreh – Literally a blanket; sexually over-willing and amenable: Jafn
Bit – Human chattel: Ranjalla and southern north-east
Borjiy – Berserker, fearless fighter: Jafn
Chaiord – Clan chieftan/king: Jafn
Chachadraj – A cat-dog, product of the mating of a cat and a dog (see also Drajjerchach): Gech originally
Concubina – Unmarried royal wife: Ruk Kar Is
Corrit – Demon-sprite: Jafn
Crait – Type of lammergeyer: Rukarian uplands
Crarrow (pl. Crarrowin) – Coven witches of Olchibe and parts of Gech
Crax – Chief witch of Crarrowin coven
Cutch – Fuck: Jafn and elsewhere
Dilf – One of several forms of dormant grain and cereal: general, but found mostly in more fertile areas
Drajjerchach – Dog-cat, product of the mating of a dog and a cat (see also Chachadraj): Gech originally
Dromaz (pl. Dromazi) – Type of camelid: Simese
Endhlefon – Time period of eleven days: Jafn
Firefex – Phoenix: Rukarian
Fleer-wolf – A kind of wolf-like jackal, known for its lamenting cries: general to the snow wastes
Flylarch – Pine-like berried plant: general to the continent
Forcutcher – Insulting variation, of obscure exact meaning, deriving from the word cutch
Gadcher – Eyesore (compare phonetically with the ascribed name of the Hell hounds – which would seem to indicate a kind of pun): Jafn
Gargolem – Magically activated metallic non-human servant; the greatest of these creatures guarded the kings at Ru Karismi prior to the White Death: Rukarian
Gler – Demon-sprite: Jafn
Gosand – Type of wild goose: Simese
Hirdiy – Nomadic band: northern north Gech
Hnowa – Riding animal: Jafn
Horsaz (pl. Horsazin) – a breed of horse apparently part-bred with fish; scaled and acclimated to land and ocean: Fazion, Kelp and Vorm
Hovor – Wind-spirit: Jafn
Icenvel – Type of weaselish thick-furred rodent: general to the continent
Insularia – Sub-river complex belonging solely to, and solely accessible to, the Magikoy: Ru Karismi
Jalee – Fleet of war vessels, including Mother Ship, usually thirteen in number, though sometimes less or more: Fazion, Kelp and Vorm
Jatcha – Hound of Hell, compare with ‘gadcher’ (Jafn): Eyesore. A pun?
Jinan/Jinnan – Magically activated house-spirit: Rukarian – normally Magikoy
Kadi – Type of gull: general to the continent
Kiss-grass – Rare soft grass-like plant, favoured by mammoths as a delicacy, either in thawed or dormant state: Olchibe and Gech
Lamascep – Sheep of long, thick wool: general to the Ruk
Lashdeer – Fine-bred, highly trained chariot animals used for high-speed travel over snow and ice: Rukarian
Mageia/Magio – Female and male witch or lesser mage: rural Ruk Kar Is, and elsewhere in the north
Magikoy – Order of magician-scholars, established centuries in the past; possessed of extraordinary and closely guarded powers: Ruk Kar Is and elsewhere in the Ruk
Maxamitan Level – Highest level of achievement available to Magikoy apprentice; the next step is to become a Magikoy Master: Ruk Kar Is
Mera – Mermaid: general to the north
Morsonesta – Burial ground located in the Insularia of the Magikoy: Ru Karismi
Oculum – Magikoy scrying glass, or magic mirror of incredible scope: Ruk Kar Is
Ourth – Elephant or mammoth: Olchibe
Scrat – Type of rat; see also scratchered: general to Southern Continent
Scratchered – Basically, over-used: Jafn
Seef – Demon, type of vampire: Jafn
Shumb – Something valuable now spoiled; may carry a reference to the sacked city of Gech, Sham: Jafn
Sihpp – Similar to seef: Jafn
Slederie – Primitive land-raft drawn by sheep or sometimes dogs: Ruk and south-east
Slee – Riding ice-carriage: Rukarian
Sleekar – Deer-drawn ice-chariot: Rukarian
Sluhts – Communal tent/cave/hut dwellings: Olchibe
Sluhtins – Large city groupings of sluhts: Olchibe
Soint – Obscure insult, seeming to have to do with either genital or lavatorial practices (?): Jafn, but also elsewhere in the north and east, including Ruk Kar Is
Subtor – Lowest underground chambers of magician’s house: Magikoy
Tattarope – Snake of corded, rope-like skin: Uaarb and far north
Thaumary – Thaumaturgic or sorcerous chamber attached to main hall, for use mostly by mages of a garth or House – even the chieftain does not enter here uninvited: Jafn
Tibbuk – Room kept for the inhaling of various smokes to do with scrying and prophecy: shamanic Simese
Towery – Complex of towers connected to each other by walkways and/or inner passages: Magikoy, Ruk Kar Is
Vrix – Demon-sprite: Jafn
Weed-of-light – Forest-growing ice-plant, having blue flowers: north and east
Werloka – Male witch: Jafn villages
Woman bow – A bow which can fire only one arrow at a time (male bows can fire, normally, up to four arrows at a time, depending on the skill of the archer): Olchibe
About the Author
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2005 by Tanith Lee
Cover design by Mimi Bark
ISBN: 978-1-4976-4888-3
This edition published in 2016 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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