The only threat lay in the person of their maker, in whose direction Tesla now turned her gaze. This time, though her eyes remained incapable of fixing upon him, she caught a glimpse. He was sitting on a chair, it seemed, but the chair was hovering three or four feet off the ground. And though she could not look directly at him, he was not so restricted. She felt his gaze. It pricked her neck. It made her rattle.
"It'll pass he said, and with those words any last hope that she'd made a mistake, and that this was not Kissoon, vanished.
"What'll pass?" she said, fighting hard to look at him. Doubtless he had good reason to prevent her laying eyes on him, which was all the more reason to defy the edict. If she could just distract him for a few moments, perhaps he'd drop his guard long enough for her to get one good look at him. "What'll pass?" she asked him again.
"The shock."
"Why should I be shocked?"
"Because you thought I was dead and gone." "Why would I think that?"
"Don't try this."
"Try what?"
"This stupid game you're playing."
"What game?"
"I said stop it!" As he yelled, she looked at him, and for perhaps the length of two heartbeats his irritation made him careless, and she had plain sight of him.
It was long enough to see why he'd kept her from looking at him. He was in transition, his skin and sinew drooping around him, gangrenous and fetid. Enough of his flesh remained for her to recognize his face. The post-simian brow, the wide nose, the jutting jaw: All had been Raul's, before Kissoon had stolen them.
Jesus... she heard Raul say, look away. Forpity's sake, look away... As it was, she had little chance. She'd no sooner registered the sight than Kissoon became aware of her scrutiny, and his will, sharp as a blow, slapped her sight aside. Tears of pain sprang into her eyes.
"You're too curious for your own good," Kissoon said.
"You're getting very vain in your old age," she replied, wiping the tears off her cheeks.
"Old? Me? No. I'll be new forever. You, on the other hand, look like shit. Were your travels worth it?"
"What do you know about my travels?" "Just because I've been out of sight doesn't mean I've been out of touch," Kissoon replied. "I've been watching the world very closely. And I've reports of you from a lot of grubby little corners. What were you looking for? Fletcher?"
"No."
"He's gone, Tesia. So's the iaff. That part of things is er. It was a simpler age, so I suppose you felt at home there, but it's over and done with."
"And what follows?" Tesia said.
"I think you know." Tesia said nothing. "Are you too afraid to say it?"
"lad, you meant'
"There. You knew all along."
"Haven't you seen enough of them?" Tesla said. "We've seen more than most, you and 1. Yet we've seen nothing. Nothing at all." There was excitement in his voice. "they will change the world out of all recognition." "And you want that?"
"Don't you?" Kissoon said. She'd forgotten how strangely persuasive he could be; how well he comprehended the ambiguities in her heart. "This chaos is no good, Tesla. Everything severed. Everything broken. The world needs to be put back together again." Like all great liars, there was enough truth in what he said to make it sound perfectly plausible.
"Unfortunately, the species can't heal itself without help," he went on.
"But not to worry. Help's on its way."
"And when it comes?"
"I told you. It'll change things out of all recognition."
"But you-"
"What about me?"
"What will it do for you?"
"Oh-that."
"Yes, that."
"It'll make me king of the hill, of course." "Plus ga change."
"And I'll have the Art." Ah, the Art! Sooner or later it always came back to that. "I'll live in one immortal day-"
"Sounds lovely. And what about the rest of us?"
"The lad'Il make theirjudgments. You'll abide by them. Simple as that. I think they have quite an appetite for the feminine. Ten years ago, they probably would have kept you for breeding. Now, of course, you'd be better used for fertilizer." He laughed. "Don't worry, I'll make sure you don't go to waste." She felt something move against her ankle, and looked down. There was a Lix there, five or six times larger than any of those she'd seen here previously. It curled around her foot, raising its head as it did so. Its open mouth was lined with tiny scarlet teeth, row upon row of them, receding down its throat.
"Wait@' she said.
"No time," Kissoon said. "Maybe I'll see you in the past, tomorrow. Maybe I'll find you in the Loop and we'll talk about how you died today."
The Lix was climbing her leg, its hold on her already tightening.
She screamed and stumbled backwards, her legs caught in the creature's coils. There was a moment when she teetered, then she fell, fell hard, the debris biting into her back. For a moment the room went white, and if she'd not had Raul yelling in her head, telling her to Hold on, hold on, she'd certainly have lost consciousness.
When the whiteness receded, she was looking towards the hearth. The Lix that had ventured there before her dialogue with Kissoon had done with warming themselves, and had turned their heads in her direction. Now they came, in a squirming river.
She tried to sit up, but their monstrous sibling had wound itself around her, incapacitating her. Her only hope was Phoebe. She craned her head round, looking for the woman, yelling her name as she did so. It was a lost cause. The room was empty, but for Kissoon and her devourers.
She looked back towards the hearth, and as if this weren't nightmare enough, realized what the Lix had been doing there. Not warming themselves at all, but feeding. What she'd taken to be branches scattered around the fire were human bones, and the stone amidst the embers a skull. Erwin Toothaker hadn't left home after all, except as smoke.
She let out a sob of horror. Then the Lix were upon her.
"Is she alive?"
Erwin went down onto his haunches beside the woman sprawled on his doorstep. Her brow was bleeding, and there was a trail of puke running from her mouth, but she was still breathing.
"She's alive," he said. "Her name's Phoebe Cobb."
The front door stood open. The air from out of the house smelled like shit and meat. Though Erwin had little to lose in his present condition, he was as scared as he'd ever been in life. He glanced back at the trio that had accompanied him here-Nordhoff, Dolan, and Dickerson-and saw unease on their faces too.
"He can't do anything to us, right?" Erwin said. "Not now."
Nordhoff shrugged. "Who the hell knows?" he said.
"What if he can see us?" Dickerson replied.
"We're never going to find out if we stay here," Dolan said impatiently and, stepping over Phoebe Cobb, he entered.
Erwin suddenly felt proprietorial. This was still his house: If anyone was going to lead the way, it should be him.
"Wait," he said to Dolan, and hurried after him down the hallway.
The Lix were not interested in her flesh (perhaps it was too leathery after so many years in the sun). they sought out her mouth and her nostrils, they went to her ears and eyes, so as to gain access to the tender stuff inside her.
She thrashed and rolled, her mouth sealed against their probing and pushing, but her nose was stopped with them now, and in a few seconds she would be out of breath. As soon as she parted her lips they would enter into her, and that would be the end.