Read The Starfollowers of Coramonde for Free Online Page B

hand
dropping to the chair arm. “I want in on those Doors Between and Beyond. I need
the mystical connection. I want to perceive things a different way.”
    She
scrutinized him coolly. It was, she thought, a decision that could as easily
have come from desperation as from reason. “Do you think you would find Dunstan?
Or Yardiff Bey?”
    He shrugged.
“I’ve seen you do things a million times weirder. At one time or another, I’ve
believed in nuclear fusion and Virgin Birth, but I never saw either one. I
admit possibilities. Look, we’ve never been great pals, but I thought it might
intrigue you.”
    She rose and
glided from the room. He waited. In a moment she returned with a tarot deck.
She held the Earnai up to the candle again and smiled. “And I thought this
would be an idle evening. Come.”
    She led him
to an inner chamber, furbished to suit her, not a sanctum, but a personal place
of solitude. The carpet was deep; the door seemed to shut airtight. She’d
arranged lamps, shades and mirrors to decorate with illuminated and shadowed
spaces. Gil found himself studying unidentifiable knickknacks, paintings, and
objects that might be musical instruments or, equally likely, rococo mobile
sculptures. Or something utterly else. Nobody really knew how old she was. What
might a finely alert mind, living for centuries, light upon as curious?
    “There are
many forms of Earnai.” She brought out a tiny brazier carved from a block of
onyx, its basin no larger than a teacup. She lit a flame beneath it. “It comes
from the heart of a plant found throughout the southern reaches, did you know
that? Some Southwastelanders call it ‘mahonn,’ which means ‘rescue.’ Among
others it is ‘k’nual, the visitor.’ It is, in different places and climes,
‘Vision Flower,’ ‘God-call,’ and ‘the Passageway.’ But it takes a measure of
art to use it safely. A single mote of the pure substance would slay you, me,
and anyone else in the room. It must be diluted, it must be handled carefully,
like a cunning beast. It is used in countless ways, you see. Effects depend on
concentration and combination.”
    She dropped
the pellet into the brazier. Thin ribbons of smoke curled up into the air. “It
can be a euphoric, or make you giddy. It can banish pain or render the
strongest man unconscious. It has been used in aphrodisiacs, and inquisitor’s
compounds.”
    At her
invitation, they arranged themselves on thick pillows on opposite sides of a
low table of old, pleasant-feeling mahogany. “That pellet, that is a thing of
the south, but the Horseblooded sometimes use it. Did Wintereye wear thimbles
or coverings on his fingertips? Ah, then he worked it from the pure himself.
The Dream-drowse is mingled with one of the noropianics. Its color and inner
striations are good, its odor untainted, perfect for what you have in mind.
Have you ever experienced the Other Sides?”
    Not certain
what she meant, he kept it to the issue at hand. “Guess not. Do we stick our
heads over it, catch it in a bag, or what?”
    “What do you
taste?”
    He rolled his
tongue experimentally. “Musk. A little tartlike, I think.”
    “Dreamdrowse.
It entered your pores, and your blood has carried it to your tongue already.”
She put the tarot deck down precisely between them. Her fingers stroked and
patted the deck slowly, renewing old ties.
    Perhaps the
Dreamdrowse was working, or the events of the night had exhausted his
restraint. On impulse, he clapped his hand down on the deck before she could
take it up. She withheld her objections, recognizing inspiration. Gabrielle had
no qualms about subordinating ceremony to revelation.
    In a motion
he never questioned, he fanned the cards out, faces down, an arc from one side
of the table to the other. She said nothing, but her green eyes flashed at him
again.
    He let his
hand rove the deck. He felt warmth rising against his palm, and picked up the
card from which it radiated. She took it gently.
    “The