Burn Bright

The cruciform was crowded now and Retra held her breath, automatically searching for Joel.

What if he is here? Now.

Suki grabbed her hand again and pointed towards the confessional queue. ‘Over there.’

‘Why do we need to confess if we can do what we like?’

Suki shrugged. ‘Weird, huh? But that’s what they told us we have to do. Maybe it’s part of the cleansing. Like the re-birth.’

Retra noticed Cal at the head of the line, next to go in.

Suki saw her too. ‘That one.’ Suki pointed behind her hand at Cal. ‘I hate her already.’

‘H-has she been mean to you?’

Suki laughed. ‘Nah. But she acts like she owns the guy on the guitar. And he is sooo hot. Why should she get dibs on him?’ She pointed.

Retra looked over at the larger apse. The guitarist still sat atop the altar, backlit by glowing jewel lamps. Recognition made her pulse quicken. ‘His name is Markes.’

‘You know him?’ Suki’s eyes lit.

‘I-I met him. That’s all. On the barge.’

‘You came by boat?’

Retra thought of the pain radiating along her leg when she left the Seal compound, and her desperate lunge to catch the barge. ‘Why? How did you come?’

‘You ever hear whirring in the sky?’

Retra nodded. ‘Fly-eyes.’

Suki shook her head. ‘Not always. Sometimes it’s draculins. I trapped one in a cave outside my town, and strapped myself to its back.’

‘What is a draculin?’

Suki rolled her eyes. ‘You must know? Giant bat with wings bigger than … two mountain bulls. They eat their own.’

‘You mean echo-locaters?’

‘Sure, if that’s what you call them.’

‘How did you know where the … draculin you caught would go?’

‘Don’t you know anything? It’s the lore. Draculins fly to Ixion in winter.’

Retra stared at the girl in amazement. ‘But I’ve heard their bite will bleed you to death?’

Suki tossed her head airily. ‘Uh-huh. But I’m here still.’ She pushed Retra forward towards the confessional. ‘Come on, you’re next.’

Retra stepped cautiously into the small, dark cubicle. She was used to confession in Grave. The priest spoke through an electrified grille and arranged degrees of punishment depending on what she had the courage to confess. Usually he ordered denial: denial of food, or conversation, and sometimes sleep. When she’d confessed to listening to the Angel Arias he had prescribed six lashes of the snake whip.

Physical pain is the best form of purification, he’d said.

Her father had delivered the blows but the disappointment on his face had stung more than the lash. She’d cried all day.

As the confessional door snapped shut behind her a sweet, musty damp filled her lungs. Why would the Ripers wish to punish them already? Modesty is a sin, Charlonge had said.

Retra trembled, confused.

The grille slid back suddenly and she gasped.

The Riper from the barge sat there, his head disembodied by the small viewing window, his eyes as cold and seeking as before. ‘What would be your pleasure, baby bat?’

‘What do you ask me that? What should I confess?’ she blurted.

‘Your desires,’ he hissed and tilted the window’s ledge towards her. It unfolded into an elaborately worked drawer of many slots, each one containing a coloured shell, capsule, pod or bead. ‘Pick your pleasure.’

‘Are they medicines?’

His smile felt like a slimy, moist creature clambering over her body. ‘Yes. If you like.’

Retra forced her fingers to the shelf. Fit in. Give them no reason to think you different … She chose a pale rose pod, a less exotic colour than the others.

‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘You must chew Rapture.’

Retra stood to leave but when she pushed the door it wouldn’t open. She used her full strength on it before turning to the Riper.

‘Chew it now!’ His smile had gone, leaving only the chill stare.

Retra thought of resisting but claustrophobia sent a wave of panic clawing at her belly. He could keep her trapped here. He could …

She placed the pod between her lips. It tasted as bitter as unripe lemon, and it crumbled in her mouth like cold, stale cake. She nibbled a little from the end.

‘All of it,’ he demanded. ‘And hurry, baby bat, others are waiting. Or are you afraid of pleasure?’

‘No. Of c-course not.’ She forced the remainder of the pod into her mouth and chewed, swallowing it in rough lumps.

Suddenly, it seemed hard to breathe in the small cubicle. She longed for space and light, for the cool air of Grave with a tinge of rain. Her body felt overheated, the velvet clinging to her, prickling her skin.

‘Don’t stray from the lit paths, baby bat,’ said the Riper.

Retra stood and pushed the door. It fell open easily this time and she stumbled out.

‘Wait for me,’ said Suki as she waltzed in.

But Retra had lost place and time. The cruciform of Vank began to shimmer around her, pulsing like an erratic and laboured heartbeat: closer then further. The candlelight streamed, bleeding upward to the arched wooden ribs and downward through the marbled floor.

With great care not to touch them, Retra moved between the rivers of lights towards the jewel-lit altar. The music drew her as if it were the cool spring rain she craved.

Markes already had an audience, a circle of admirers gathered at his feet. Cal sat there, closest to him.

Retra stepped into the centre of the circle of listeners, ignoring their calls for her to sit down.

Markes lifted his head from his guitar at the sight of her. What? He mouthed the question.

In reply, she arched her back and lifted her hands to her hips.

His sharp intake of breath told her that he saw what she was about to do. His eyes fixed on her as she yielded to a building desire. She wanted to touch Markes, feel his hair, touch her fingers to his lips. Her body ached to be close to him.

She took a step forward. Another one. Picking her way through the circle until she stood before him and his guitar. She couldn’t see anyone else now. The rest of the world had become a dark, narrow place with Markes the point of light. ‘You,’ she said. ‘Me.’

But the words seemed to make the darkness swirl and toss her around. Markes shrank in her vision, becoming smaller, less wondrous, less …

Someone shook her: angry and sharp, as if to rattle her to pieces.

‘Stop it!’ shouted Cal. ‘Go away. Leave him alone.’ She forced Retra back from the altar like an overzealous guard.

Markes climbed down, his guitar hanging at his side and his brow wrinkled with concern. ‘Retra, are you sick?’

She couldn’t answer him. Nor could she feel her feet or her knees or the flesh in between. Strange shapes formed, collecting either side of Markes: wings and claws and long, slavering tongues. She put her hands up to bat them away.

‘What is it?’ cried Markes. ‘What can you see?’

‘More like what did you take,’ said another voice. Suki’s almond eyes swam into her view.

‘Suki, do you see them – the claws?’ Retra whispered.

Suki’s fingers gripped her arm, nails biting her skin. ‘Don’t see nothin’ but him.’ She fluttered her eyes. ‘And I don’t mind looking at that.’

Markes frowned. ‘What did you say about claws? What –’

But then Cal and the crowd closed in on them, collecting Markes, urging him back to his guitar and the altar, and expunging Retra and Suki in their wake.

As Markes climbed back to his seat the claws and wings vanished and Retra sagged back against Suki with relief. The world had come back, the smell of incense and the murmur of voices.

‘Markes,’ voices carolled. ‘Play for us. Play …’

A girl in black silk shorts and a metallic tank top jumped up alongside him. ‘I’ll dance for you.’

Cal tugged the girl down. ‘No you won’t.’

The girl slapped at Cal but Cal ducked and kicked her ankle. Arms grabbed at them and bodies moved in between until Retra could barely see Cal or the girl at all.

Suki forced a beaker of water into Retra’s hand. ‘Here.’

She drank it, coughing a little. The water sank heavily onto her stomach and she pressed her hand to her mouth.

‘You gonna be sick?’

Retra nodded.

Suki pointed to a small, dark apse furnished with a large urn to one side of the side of the altar. ‘In there.’

Retra ran a few steps and sank her face into the urn, heaving the water up. Her sight cleared properly and she realised her velvet dress had ridden up high on her hips and that her hair had come loose. She wrenched her dress down over her thighs, humiliated, and retied her hair.

‘Better?’ asked Suki. She stood behind her, unfazed by the vomit.

‘I think so. I’m sorry.’

Suki shrugged. ‘People get sick. I’ve nursed plenty of ’em. What did you take?’

‘A Rapture p-pod.’

‘How much of it?’

‘He-he told me to eat it all.’

‘Modai gave you a whole rapture pod? No wonder you were about to do the la la.’

‘Is that the Riper’s name?’

‘Yeah, ’parently. Someone in the line told me about him while you were in there. Asmodai is the demon of lust and wrath and this guy is supposed to be his half-mortal son. Fits him, don’t you think?’ She glanced around. ‘The uthers will clean this up. Come on, let’s get out of here.’

Retra got to her feet and followed Suki out of the cruciform, leaving Markes and his audience behind them.