LITMIR.BIZ

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been glad that his inspiration had returned.

      … Maestro …’ he murmured, face to the musty boards.

      ‘Not here,’ came a voice from behind him. It was not, he knew, one of the voiders. They could whistle, but not speak. ‘You were Sartori’s creature, were you? I don’t remember that.’

      The speaker was precise, cautious and smug. Unable to turn. Chant had to wait until the man walked past his supine body to get a sight of him. He knew better than to judge by appearances. He, whose flesh was not his own, but of the Maestro’s sculpting. Though the man in front of him looked human enough, he had the voiders in tow, and spoke with knowledge of things few humans had access to. His face was an overripe cheese, drooping with jowls and weary folds around the eyes, his expression that of a funereal comic. The smugness in his voice was here too, in the studied way he licked upper and lower lips with his tongue before he spoke, and tapped the fingertips of each hand together as he judged the broken man at his feet. He wore an immaculately tailored three-piece suit, cut from a cloth of apricot cream. Chant would have given a good deal to break the bastard’s nose so he bled on it.

      ‘I never did meet Sartori,’ the man said. ‘Whatever happened to him?’ He went down on his haunches in front of Chant and suddenly snatched hold of a handful of his hair. ‘I asked you what happened to your Maestro,’ he said. ‘I’m Dowd, by the way. You never knew my master, the Lord Godolphin, and I never knew yours. But they’re gone, and you’re scrabbling around for work. Well, you won’t have to do it any longer, if you take my meaning.’

      ‘Did you … did you send him to me?’

      ‘It would help my comprehension if you could be more specific’

      ‘Estabrook.’

      ‘Oh yes. Him.’

      ‘You did. Why?’

      ‘Wheels within wheels, my dove,’ Dowd said. ‘I’d tell you the whole bitter story, but you don’t have the time to listen and I don’t have the patience to explain. I knew of a man who needed an assassin. I knew of another man who dealt in them. Let’s leave it at that.’

      ‘But how did you know about me?’

      ‘You’re not discreet,’ Dowd replied. ‘You get drunk on the Queen’s birthday, and you gab like an Irishman at a wake. Lovey, it draws attention sooner or later.’

      ‘Once in while …’

      ‘I know, you get melancholy. We all do, lovey, we all do. But some of us do our weeping in private, and some of us’ - he let Chant’s head drop - ‘make fucking public spectacles of ourselves. There are consequences, lovey, didn’t Sartori tell you that? There are always consequences. You’ve begun something with this Estabrook business, for instance, and I’ll need to watch it closely, or before we know it there’ll be ripples, spreading through the Imajica.’

      ‥ the Imajica

      That’s right. From here to the margin of the First Dominion. To the region of the Unbeheld Himself.’

      Chant began to gasp, and Dowd - realizing he’d hit a nerve—leaned towards his victim.

      ‘Do I detect a little anxiety?’ he said. ‘Are you afraid of going into the glory of our Lord Hapexamendios?’

      Chant’s voice was frail now. ‘Yes …’ he murmured.

      ‘Why?’ Dowd wanted to know. ‘Because of your crimes?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘What are your crimes? Do tell me. We needn’t bother with the little things. Just the really shameful stuff’ll do.’

      ‘I’ve had dealings with a Eurhetemec.’

      ‘Have you indeed?’ Dowd said. ‘How ever did you get back to Yzordderrex to do that?’

      ‘I didn’t,’ Chant replied. ‘My dealings … were here in the Fifth.’

      ‘Really,’ said Dowd softly. ‘I didn’t know there were Eurhetemecs here. You learn something new every day. But, lovey, that’s no great crime. The Unbeheld’s going to forgive a poxy little trespass like that. Unless …’ He stopped for a moment, turning over a new possibility. ‘Unless, the Eurhetemec was a mystif. ‥ ’ He trailed the thought, but Chant remained silent. ‘Oh, my dove,’ Dowd said. ‘It wasn’t, was it?’ Another pause. ‘Oh, it was. It was.’ He sounded almost enchanted. There’s a mystif in the Fifth, and what? You’re in love with it? You’d better tell me before you run out of breath, lovey. In a few minutes your eternal soul will be waiting at Hapexamendios’s door.’

      Chant shuddered. The assassin …’ he said.

      ‘What about the assassin?’ came the reply. Then realizing what he’d just heard, Dowd drew a long, slow breath. ‘The assassin is a mystif?’ he said.

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Oh, my sweet Hyo!’ he exclaimed. ‘A mystif!’ The enchantment had vanished from his voice now. He was hard and dry. ‘Do you know what they can do? The deceits they’ve got at their disposal? This was supposed to be an anonymous piece of shit-stirring, and look what you’ve done!’ His voice softened again. ‘Was it beautiful?’ he asked. ‘No, no. Don’t tell me. Let me have the surprise, when I see it face to face.’ He turned to the voiders. ‘Pick the fucker up,’ he said.

      They stepped forward, and raised Chant by his broken arms. There was no strength left in his neck, and his head lolled forward, a solid stream of bilious fluid running from mouth and nostrils. ‘How often does the Eurhetemec tribe produce a mystif?’ Dowd mused, half to himself. ‘Every ten years? Every fifty? They’re certainly rare. And there you are, blithely hiring one of these little divinities as an assassin. Imagine! How pitiful, that it had fallen so low. I must ask it how that came about. ‥’ He stepped towards Chant, and at Dowd’s order one of the voiders raised Chant’s head by the hair. ‘I need the mystif’s whereabouts,’ Dowd said, ‘and its name.’

      Chant sobbed through his bile. ‘Please …’ he said, ‘… I meant … I … meant. ‥’

      ‘Yes, yes. No harm. You were just doing your duty. The Unbeheld will forgive you, I guarantee it. But the mystif, lovey, I need you to tell me about the mystif. Where can I find it? Just speak the words, and you won’t ever have to think about it again. You’ll go into the presence of the Unbeheld like a babe.’

      ‘I will?’

      ‘You will. Trust me. Just give me its name and tell me the place where I can find it.’

      ‘Name … and … place.’

      ‘That’s right. But get to it, lovey, before it’s too late!’

      Chant took as deep a breath as his collapsing lungs allowed. ‘It’s called Pie’oh’pah,’ he said.

      Dowd stepped back from the dying man as if slapped. ‘Pie’oh’pah? Are you sure?’

      … I’m sure …’

      ‘Pie’oh’pah is alive? And Estabrook hired it?’ ‘Yes.’

      Dowd threw off his imitation of a Father Confessor, and murmured a fretful question of himself. ‘What does this mean?’ he said.

      Chant made a pained little moan, his system racked by further waves of dissolution. Realizing that time was now very short, Dowd pressed the man afresh.

      ‘Where is this mystif? Quickly, now! Quickly!’

      Chant’s face was decaying, cobs of withered flesh sliding off his slickened bone. When he answered it, it was with half a mouth. But answer he did, to be unburdened.

      ‘I thank you,’ Dowd said to him, when all the information had been supplied.

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