Laldasa (58 page)

‘There' was a ring in what appeared to be an altar roughly three feet high and four feet long. Vedda left Ana's side momentarily to light a series of braziers set around the altar. The chamber blazed with light and the walls came to lurid life. They were covered with murals depicting various Bogar rites and the play of the twin god. The dominant color was red. Ana looked away into the fire.

Vedda was before her again, then, his hands going to the closes of her coverall.

“Are you prepared to judge me, Rohina?”

Ana swore she could hear the beating of her heart above the gurgle of water and the roar of flame. She had been willing Jaya to her—why was he not here?

“This must be done according to ritual, Namun Vedda. According to the ways of the god of Darkness.”

His face was radiant, seeming lit from within by secret rapture. He raised her chained hands, kissed them.

“Instruct me, my goddess.”

She needed him at a disadvantage. She also needed to be rid of these damned manacles.

“Your clothes. Remove them. You must be innocent of clothing.”

He bowed and obeyed. He removed his garments slowly, making a ritual performance of the act. Ana did not watch, but focused on her next move. Once naked, he bowed before her again. He was fully aroused. Ana bit down on her fear and strove not to notice or react.

She raised her manacled hands. “I must also disrobe. You'll have to remove these.”

He seemed amused. “You will not attempt to escape?”

“I give you my word—the word of a Rohina.”

He shook his head, smiling.

“If this is not done according to Rohin ritual, you will neither attain surata nor receive my Gift, surely you understand this, Master Namun. You have studied the Bogar disciplines. Is the status of Master reached without attention to ritual?”

“No. You're quite right. But, you see. I can cut the fabric away.” He retrieved the dagger.

Ana transmuted her fear into anger and gave him the full brunt of that. “Do you not want this Gift? According to ritual, you must undress me with care and gentleness. You are to become my lover, Namun, before the eyes of my god.”

She jerked her head in the direction of the vivid effigy on the wall that curved over the altar. “How will my god—my father—sanctify our union, if he sees you rip the clothes from my body as if I were a common slave?”

He seemed to consider that. He set the dagger aside again and put his hands to the manacles.

Ana breathed again in relief. The moment her hands were free, she thought, that dagger would be in them. She would not escape—she had promised that—but she had not promised she wouldn't take him prisoner.

He removed the manacle from her right wrist, but instead of turning to the left one, he slipped the top close of her coverall.

“Tell me how it will be,” he breathed, continuing his task. “Where will I receive my Gift?”

Damn him! Ana began to doubt he was as mad as he seemed.

“On the altar.” Where I might be able to spill that brazier full of hot coals on you.

He assumed she meant to be taken to the altar, and so led her to it. She turned and sat, her eyes on the passage to freedom, the brazier at her back. Vedda continued to unfasten her coverall.

She turned her attention to the manacles. They were not locked, but the catches were intricate and would require both time and attention—or inattention, she thought, with a glance at Namun Vedda's intense expression.

“In the joining,” she said, struggling to keep her voice soft and low, straining to keep it from shattering. “I will taste of your very soul and know if it is sweet or bitter. In this way, your motives will be judged, your actions, your life. Not just by me, but by the god of this dark world. I must warn you, Namun, I have already tasted bitterness in your touch.”

As she had hoped, the remark stopped him in the act of tugging the sleeve from her arm.

“What do you mean?”

“My neck still aches from the bite of your fingers.”

His eyes moved to the bruises there and widened in stunned anger. “Who did this to you? Did Jaya Sarojin do this?”

He didn't remember. Did she dare remind him? Most likely not, but she could attempt to make the lie instructional.

“Your friend Bhrasta,” she said. “He tried to take the Jadu from me by force, without the ritual. That is the reality behind his death.”

He studied her momentarily, his eyes locked with hers, then he said, “Instruct me, Deva.”

A final tug at the sleeve bared her shoulder. Clever. Or hungry. Or both. She shivered. It wasn't cold here, but the air was heavy with mist and her camisole already soaked through, its azure muted to a dark and indeterminate shade.

“Continue.” She held up the other wrist. “Slowly. Gently.”

As she expected, he took the precaution of returning the first manacle to its place before loosing the second. Where were Jaya and Bithal?

“I am a balance,” Ana told him as he worked. She found it difficult to keep her eyes from his rapt face with its expression of mixed adoration and lust. “I weigh a man's soul. I weigh his life. Each touch reveals more and more of him to my inner Sight.”

The top of her coverall now lay about her hips and Vedda was preparing to refasten the second manacle.

“I must be able to embrace you, Namun, to touch you according to the ritual.”

He hesitated, then let the manacle dangle. He reached for the folds of the coverall to complete his task.

Ana leaned forward and put her lips to his ear. “In the moment of surata,” she breathed, ”when our eyes meet, the weighing will be complete. The god and I will know you through and through and will place on each side—the good and the evil—all the thoughts, the acts, the motives, the intentions. If the balance tilts to the good, the Jadu will flow from my body to yours—but if the balance tilts to the evil, your soul will be sucked away into the eyes of Darkness.”

She looked straight up to the curve of wall above the altar, directly into the fierce painted eyes of the deity. He followed her gaze and froze.

“We must hurry,” she whispered. Her lips grazed his ear, making him gasp as if shocked. “Jaya and the Balin must not stumble upon us here before the weighing is complete.”

His eyes caught hers, indecision worrying their depths. She rose and let the coveralls slip down around her ankles. They revealed the azure sheen of silken leggings that clung to her damply. She stepped out of them and raised her hands to the contorted effigy above, her eyes studying the catch of her remaining manacle.

“Oh, Nameless One, your daughter prepares herself for your pleasure.”

Now, she looked at Vedda, still on his knees beside her, his eyes on her face.

“Supplicate the god, as I have done. Do not rise,” she added sharply, when he would have done so. “It would not be seemly. You beg a Gift, Namun ... to be my lover.”

She didn't gag—a triumph. She forced her voice to be sweet, soft, caressing, her lips to curve in a smile.

He raised his hands. “Oh, Nameless One, your son prepares himself for your pleasure.”

Ana smiled at him. “Now rise,” she instructed him, “and lie upon the altar.”

He rose. “Shall I not continue ... ?” He motioned toward her partially clad body.

“According to ritual,” she said, “you must complete your task upon the altar. Lie down, my lover, and I will mount you.”

He was quivering with desire now; his eyes were bright with it; his skin was flushed with it. He lay down upon the damp, glistening altar to await his Gift.

Ana, calculating how far she would have to leap to get the dagger, raised her eyes to the god-effigy again.

“Oh, Nameless One, the Moment of Weighing is near. Prepare to give of your soul ... or to receive this man's soul into yourself.”

She shifted her weight as if preparing to mount the altar, then leapt for the dagger. The manacle chain snapped taut before she reached the weapon, sending a shockwave of pain through her wrist and arm. She ignored it, lunged again, and had the thing in her hand.

There was no time for triumph. Another hand wrenched the dagger away and flung it into the steaming gloom.

Ana's eyes flung upward into the pale, sweating face of Duran Prakash.

“My dear Duran ... ”

Ana and Prakash turned in unison to the altar.

Naked as he was, quivering and still visibly aroused, Namun Vedda was yet in possession of his dignity. He rolled over onto his side and continued pleasantly: “What in the name of God are you doing here? You're supposed to be speeding toward Avasa.”

“You mean I'm supposed to be speeding toward Niraya Hell. I am here, dear Namun, to repay your kindness to me—and to Nigu.”

Prakash lifted his left hand into the current of light that lapped over the altar stone. There was a lightning pistol in it. He stopped the movement when the delicate, pencil thin muzzle pointed at Vedda's groin.

Fear poured over Ana from the sudden fountain of it in Vedda's soul. It surpassed her own, numbing her.

“What are you talking about?” the fear puzzled. “Do you insinuate that I betrayed you?”

“You did betray us—with your very careful arrangements for our escape from Kasi. You betrayed Bhaktasu Sarojin and his son and Bel Adivaram. How was I to believe you wouldn't betray us? I followed my instincts, Namun. I knew you had your own plans for escape. I figured my best recourse was to stay as close to you as possible.” He smiled. “I was in the guest cabin of the Black Paruta. I tried to convince Nigu to join me, but he, alas, died believing you his loyal friend.”

Vedda shook his head. “I was his friend. I saved him from ignominy—from the punishments the Circle of Nine would doubtless heap upon him when they caught up with him.”

“So, instead, you sped him into the punishments of Niraya.”

Prakash glanced about the cavern a strange smile twisting his lips. “This place is close to Hell—or so say the priggish Rohin.”

He eyed Ana, who could only stare back, praying he hadn't noticed her toying with the latch of her manacle, which she now held together with her free hand.

“What do you say, Rohina? How close to Hell do you reckon we are?”

“Very close, Prakash-sama.”

Vedda stirred. “Duran, I assure you-“

Prakash jiggled the pistol. “Save your lies. I know what you are. A betrayer. You'd betray your own god—you have betrayed it. Such hypocrisy: reviling me for my study of the Bogar, while you, yourself, were a secret devotee.”

“I tread a higher Path than a mere-“

“Oh, of course, you are Master Namun. The priests here worship you. Would that have anything to do with the drugs that pour out of your laboratories—drugs these poor fools inhale to increase their ecstasy? Look at you: cowering beneath your god's loins, waiting for some kind of power to drip from them; trying to squeeze it out of this woman. You defiler. You deserve to die.”

Vedda trembled like water in wind, but his voice remained deceptively calm. “Duran, must I beg you not to do this?”

“Oh, don't pray to me! Pray to your god! Pray to this sleeping womb!” He cocked his head to one side. “But pray now.”

The gun barrel rose.

Ana chose that moment to gouge Duran Prakash's ribs with a well-aimed elbow. The pistol flared, melting through the base of a nearby brazier and sending a shower of coals and flame to the floor.

Prakash dodged the searing stuff, slipped on the slick stone of the floor and fell headlong into the stream.

Ana shed the manacles, kicked her feet free of her coveralls, and bolted for freedom. The corridor was dark after the brightness of the red shrine. She couldn't keep her feet on the narrow path, but slipped and fell again and again, clawing her way upright, growling in frustration, gasping for breath. The corridor seemed endless.

When she had begun to think herself lost, she saw the triangular portal with its veil of water. Beyond was the chamber of pools—and Jaya. Her cry of relief twisted into a roar of fear and rage as someone tackled her from behind.

Violent hands dragged her upright and the sharp point of a dagger pricked her belly.

“Ah, my beloved,” murmured Namun Vedda in her ear, “it appears we must complete our destiny elsewhere. It is time to leave. Move forward please.”

“Jaya is out there,” she warned him. “And the Balin.”

“Yes, I know. But unless I am very much mistaken, they will not train their weapons on me while you are in my arms.”

oOo

Jaya's heart felt as if it had been scoured out by fire. He was beyond panic. Ana had been up at the feet of the statue waiting, and then she was gone—and wherever she was, she was terrified. He'd alerted the Balin, who had at first been bemused by his certainty that something was wrong. But Ana was not where they had left her at the edge of the reflecting pool.