Charles Stross - Different Flesh.pdf - Charles Stross - margozap

Different Flesh

Soiree at Schloss Twilight

The five of them gathered together on the stone balcony that jutted from the western wing of the

ballroom, high above the formal gardens of the Schloss Twilight. The dancers whirled on into the

evening behind them, unaware of the passage of time outside their dream of music and motion. Bishop

Morden looked over the crumbling balustrade at the hedges and flower beds below. One of the stuffed

penguins caught a slanting ray of light and seemed to wink at him; he shuddered, briefly genuflected to

the five poi nts, then turned away.

"Would you care for an aperitif?" asked Lady Stael, expectantly. "I am aware that the servants cannot be

relied upon today, but -- "

The Bishop smiled uneasily and sidled away from the edge of the terrace. "No my dear," he said, "I fear

for my digestion! Perhaps an infusion of gentian would be of help, but for the time being I am distraught

with worries that I would not care to inflict upon your gentle head: and they have sorely aggravated my

colic. Perhaps, however, our noble friend the Paramage -- "

Lady Stael stared at him; her eyes raked him with a peculiarly matronly expression of disdain that sat ill

with her appearance of blossoming youth, making her look like something preserved beyond its time.

"The so-called Paramage and his disreputable colleagues are here at the bidding of my fate, to honour an

appointment made some seventy years ago," she murmured. "If they should ask for refreshments, why, I

should have to ensure their satisfaction! But they are not welcome, you understand. Unlike yourself."

"My apologies, madam," said the Bishop, sweating under his stiff collar. "I was unaware -- "

Lady Stael turned and stared past the Bishop. He followed the direction of her gaze. A table of filigree

and shadow graced the far end of the balcony, concealed from the dancers in the ballroom by the thick

velvet drapes of the curtains. Five chairs were drawn up around it. One was occupied by a strange

gentleman whose appearance was that of a ruinous ruffian or cutthroat; a man who by rights should

grace her dungeon rather than her balcony. The brim of his hat was drawn low across his eyes, and it

was ob vious that there was room-a-plenty for any number of dark thoughts behind his shadowed brow.

Next to him sat Jack-Jones the Paramage, a saturnine man of middle years who wore his beard in the

archaic manner of a castillian noble. His expression was jovial but his hair and his pale blue eyes were

glacial, even when he laughed. And finally, occupying a seat so close to the curtains that he almost

blended in with the shadows, was a figure that Jack-Jones had not introduced. This person was swathed

from head < P> o foot in a black and odiferous robe, such that the Bishop could hardly blame Lady Stael

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Different Flesh

for not desiring him on her premises. He looked like a hedge-priest and he smelt, not to put too fine a

point upon it, like Death.

"It is sometimes said," Lady Stael muttered, "that the presence of guests is a trial sent by the Lord to test

our wits and our witticisms. If that is the case then I am afraid I am sore wanting, for whenever I

confront these three desperadoes all badinage flees! Perhaps it bears upon the evening ahead. Your

holiness, I do not wish to sit with these alone, and I would surely not wish to presume upon your

patience, but -- "

The Bishop smiled and bobbed his head. "But why, if that is the case, do you come out here to take in

the sunset?" he asked. "Surely there is a ball behind us, and no shortage of guests who would willingly

trip away the darkness with the lady of the household come Heaven or Nightmare! Why come out here?"

He watched her face closely. The Bishop was not a young man -- there were very few such still alive --

and he had done many strange things before he took the cloth, yet there was a kernel within Lady Stael

that, should it crack, he feared to see. She had lived within her shell for a long time; and she had steeped

herself soul-deep in a bitterness like that of cyanic almonds, until her facade of youth was a mockery.

Her husband had not been seen for many years, not since he set off on his crusade in search of the

unsighted lands of the anti-arctic: and yet still she remained loyal to his memory and maintained

appearances.

She breathed deeply. "I am not a young maiden any more, Marcus, however I might preserve this flesh I

inhabit. Please don't presume upon my innocence. Presume by all means upon my chastity -- certainly,

in the absence of my lord and master -- but not upon my naivete! Without the Paramage all life might

have fled this soul long ago. I owe him this appointment, upon the unburied body of my past lives, but I

shall not be coerced into enjoying it! For I know what game that man has brought his friends h ere to

play, tonight."

The Bishop was taken aback at this invective, directed by a member of the fair sex at a gentleman of

whom, although he had little direct knowledge, he had heard much. "Surely it is not as bad as that?" he

asked, unwisely treading upon her sensibilities. "Has he made any improper adv -- "

"He has not," she said icily. "It is merely his presence, and all that it implies! On this night of all nights,

to be trapped on a crumbling balcony with such a man! The indignity!"

The Bishop sighed. "My Lady," he said, "do you not remember the teachings of Our Lord? That self-

consciousness is the greatest sin, for the unconscious mind does know things of which we are unaware,

so that we would live lives enchained within the dungeons of our psyches were we not to expose it to

each other in agape? That, therefore, to hold to this grudge solely on behalf of his perceived guilt for a

crime not yet -- "

" -- You have not heard it from his own lips!" she exclaimed, falling silent with a sudden vehemence that

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spoke louder than her words. "From the lips of the Paramage, I mean; far be it from me to impute doubts

as to your interpretation of Our Lord's Message!"

"Pardon me then, my Lady," said the Bishop, touching his rosary to feel the holy pentagon. "Would it

not then be worthwhile for me to discern the truth for myself, from the lips of the man whom you assert

is making this demand upon you? And perhaps, in so doing, lead another lost soul into the light?"

She sighed, and suddenly he perceived the evanescent quality of youth that her husband Lord Stael must

have discerned in her when he married her so many years ago. "You are right and true as always,

Marcus: your Holiness. I should not lose my temper over such ... trifles. If the world is indeed coming to

an end, tonight of all nights, it is unfitting for me to reach the extent of my life as a middle-aged

harridan ... "

"How many years have you been lady of this demesne?" asked the Bishop, softly. He turned and stared

out at the shadows lengthening across the lawn below.

"Four decades past," she said quietly. With a gloved hand she gathered up the ice-blue skirts of her gown

and turned towards the table. "And I was thrice reborn when he married me: firstly as a sailor of no

consequence upon the Sea of Yang, then as a -- woman -- who met with an untimely end, and then into

my present skin. Three lives, Bishop: is that all there is to this universe? Come, let us join the gamers.

You are right as usual, it would not be correct for me to be inhospitable to my guests on this night of all

nights."

She extended her arm and the Bishop took it, escorting her across the mossy flagstones of the balcony

towards the gaming table at which the wizard and his companions waited. Behind them, the dancers

whirled to the strains of a chamber orchestra; they whirled as the rays of the setting sun lanced through

the tall glass windows and fell across the parquet for the last time; they spun like tops across the

polished floor as the sands trickled out through the smallest aperture of all, as the great and universa l

orrery ran down.

As they approached the table the Paramage glanced up. He paused in mid-sentence, his mouth open as if

entrapped in the incantation of some mystic function, and then he began to smile. As he smiled, the two

vacant chairs moved silently, turning to accommodate their approaching occupants.

"Good evening to you, my Lady," said Jack-Jones. "Is that not Bishop Moran you bring to our table? I

must admit I was half-expecting him. A delight, I'm sure!" He stood and extended a hand; behind him

the rogue and the cowled sacerdote rose to their feet..

Lady Stael extended an arm, and the Paramage bent to kiss her wrist. As his lips brushed the black

velvet of her glove a shot rang out from beneath the balcony, followed by a moan of utter despair and

loathing. The wizard and the lady froze as the hooded monastic turned to stare across the garden. "The

servants are playing Muscovian Roulette," he said, his voice bereft of all intonation. "The cook appears

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to have won. That is his wife's lament." There was a second shot, and the moaning ceased instantly. < P>

"Who will clear the dishes, then?" asked Lady Stael.

Jack-Jones smiled again. "That is hardly a problem," he said. "Come, my Lady! Eat, drink, be merry --

for tomorrow we will most certainly not be around to die."

The Bishop sat down uneasily. As he did so, the chair slid towards the table as if an invisible footman

stood at his back. He grasped the arms, feeling carved lion-faces press into his palms. "Would that I

could be so certain, your Excellency. If perhaps I have understood your prophecy correctly -- "

"Call me Jack, please!" said the wizard; "and I may call you Marcus, perhaps? My Lady, you are radiant

tonight! The earrings of amber are so fine; am I correct in perceiving that those are tiny salamanders

trapped within?"

She smiled coolly and withdrew her hand. "They are not amber but glass, and the occupants are not

reptiles," she said. "They are the embalmed brains of my first-born twins, who came into this world

rather too early. I shall not bear any others," she added, "but it gives me a certain comfort to wear them

from time to time. I fancy I can hear them whispering to me ... "

The cowled priest nodded understandingly, and an odour of tomb-rot swept from his hood. "That is a

meagre encouragement, but a real one," he said. "As one who has never sown or reaped the seed of the

loins, it behoves me to congratulate you upon your partial success. There was once a time when

motherhood was cheap and lives were short: but no more!"

He retreated from the balustrade, sat down and rearranged his cowl. The Bishop was intrigued, and

somewhat chilled, to realise that not once had the man's face come into view. There was a great geas at

work on Lady Stael, if his senses were informing him correctly: and this secretive monk was part of it.

The rough-looking man in the wide-brimmed hat and the leather suit sat down. He had remained silent

during the introductions, but now he tilted his face up and looked at his hostess. His jaw was unshaven

and his eyes were expressionless. "I am pleased to meet you," he said slowly. "My friend, his Excellency

Jack-Jones, instructed me to come to this place to facilitate the coming event. I am deeply appreciative

of such an -- "

"But what's your name?" Lady Stael interrupted.

The ruffian grinned with the fey expression of one who knew all the cards in the game of life. "I am the

Last Gambler," he said. "I teach the statistics of uncertainty, those of the honourable Thomas Bayes in

particular. Would you care for a lesson?"

The Lady recoiled, her cheeks flushing bright red. "Certainly not!" she said furiously. "Unless you can

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tell me the odds upon my husband being alive and returning to wreak justice upon such as yourself!" She

turned away suddenly, so that only the Bishop glimpsed the film of tears that lay across her eyes as she

stared at the distant hills.

"That and other things can I estimate," said the Gambler softly, his undertone directed at the hooded

monk. "But methinks the Lady would not be of a mind to thank me for it." He reached to the table and

raised a tulip-stemmed glass to his lips. Red liqueur caught the setting rays. "Shall we begin?"

"Begin what?" asked the Bishop distractedly. His attention was directed upon Lady Stael, towards whom

he felt more concern than he knew to be right and proper. She was, he decided, very beautiful, especially

when she shaved her scalp so that only a thin patina of gold fuzz caught the light, setting off the

magnificence of her decolletage.

The Gambler produced a deck of peculiarly large cards, and laid it flat upon the table-top. He sat back,

contemplating it. "Has anyone explained to you why we are gathered here tonight?" asked Jack-Jones.

The Bishop shook his head. "I fear not," he said benignly. "Am I to understand that this is something

more than a friendly soiree, on the occasion of the ball given by her Ladyship in honour of the end of the

world?"

The Paramage smiled enigmatically.

"It is more than that," said the hooded figure. "For tonight is the twilight of the universe, as the worms of

rebirth multiply through the fabric of incarnation. It is an evening for truth and consequences, for naked

ambition and lust laid bare to reveal the chance of stillborn futures; an evening for the revelation of

doom. And we who are gathered here tonight all have a role to play -- yourself, your Holiness, and her

Ladyship too -- for this was the only event that was foreordained."

"What do you mean?" Sudden icy fear rooted Marcus to his chair and liquefied his guts. He looked up as

Lady Stael glanced back at him. Her face resembled a shattered mask of anguish as she met his eyes.

"False pretences, Bishop Moran," she whispered. "I pray you will forgive me, but I could not bear to

face this ordeal alone! Not only is one of these three men responsible for the end of the universe, but

another has the ability to revoke such a cosmic judgement as has gathered all the threads of time through

this one knot-hole, and poised the blade above it. Yet they will not tell me who, or why, or how to avert

this fate, until I judge with my own wits and emotions as to which of us, and why, might desi re the

ending of eternity itself! And so I brought you along, for if this world should end at midnight you too

will end with it; and if you can advise me fearlessly and correctly, as in the past ... why, then we might

survive."

Her face went ashen as the Last Gambler reached out with a certain panache and turned the top card on

his deck face up. It was not a card with which Marcus was familiar; it was neither playing card nor tarot,

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Charles Stross - Different Flesh.pdf

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