Curse of the Gianes Read online

  Everyday Spectres: Curse of the Gianes

  Copyright © 2006 by A.M. Riley

  All rights reserved. No part of this eBook may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address Torquere Press, PO Box 2545, Round Rock, TX 78680.

  ISBN: 1-60370-004-8, 978-1-60370-004-7

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Torquere Press electronic edition / April 2007

  Torquere Press eBooks are published by Torquere Press, PO Box 2545, Round Rock, TX 78680.

  www.torquerepress.com

  “SHUT UP IN THERE!”

  Bill watched his wife beating the kitchen wall with her slipper and shook his head. “Won’t do no good.”

  Patricia dropped the slipper to the floor and slid her foot back into it. “I can’t stand it anymore, Billy,”

  From the other side of the wall the wailing started again. And then the wall started to bump rhythmically. “Oh! Oh! OH!” cried a high voice, beating a kind of contrapuncto to the lower, deeper howls.

  Bill chuckled. “He must be good,” he said. “He’s makin’ him scream.”

  Patricia gave him one of those looks only wives can give a man. It was a look born of countless small indignities. “That’s what you think of? I’m listening to that all DAY, Billy. And then I have my shift at night.”

  Bill nodded. “Yeah, it’s rough.”

  “Now! Now! Now!” screamed the voice on the other side. The wall vibrated violently, and a picture went crooked where it was hanging. Bill buried his smile in a cup of coffee.

  “Billy, I wish you’d go talk to them,” said Patricia.

  Bill imagined the guys next door. The one looked like The Sandman, from the comic books. Just as big and ghoulish. And Billy’d never seen him crack a smile. And the other had a look about him that made a man, even a man confident about his own identity, a little … curious. Billy imagined asking either of those guys to stop doing whatever it was that made them scream like that.

  “I hate to be one of those kinds of neighbors,” he said to his wife.

  Patricia gave him another one of those looks and then buried her head in the refrigerator, tsking and muttering.

  “By the Saints!” howled the deeper voice and Billy shook his head, grinning. Go for it, Big Guy, he thought. Man had lived next door to them for years and never made a sound. In the past month, though, he’d gotten more action than Billy had in his first year of marriage. He slid a glance at his wife’s tushie, sticking out from the refrigerator door. And Patricia hadn’t been no shy violet then neither.

  Well, if you can’t beat ‘em… Billy set down his coffee and sidled up to that flower-covered housecoat. “Hey baby,” he said.

  ***

  Lips swollen, skin a sheen of sweat, golden hair a halo of sun-lightened strands on the pillow around his head, Maeebsef blinked violet eyes and smiled up at his lover from their bed. “O’Grady?” he purred. And he stirred restlessly on the satin sheets, long white body arching seductively.

  “Oh Gods,” O’Grady stopped in the midst of donning his hairshirt, eyes caught by the sight of that tight white bottom as it lifted from the blue satin.

  “O’Grady?”

  O’Grady’s gaze jerked up to Maeebsef’s face. Maeebsef’s eyes twinkled as only a faerie’s can. “I said, must you go out today?”

  O’Grady cleared his throat, scrubbing a hand through his wild hair and wandering over to the bureau where he kept his stock of brandies. He poured himself a generous dollop. “I had a dream,” he said, “another one.”

  Maebsef moved restlessly on the bed, his hand wandering to his right nipple and playing with it. “Was it an omen?”

  “Probably.” O’Grady noticed a pair of shimmering sheer white stockings hanging from the fan overhead and pulled them down. Then went and sat next to Maebsef.

  Maeebsef rolled his head against O’Grady’s hip. “Tell me about the nightmare.”

  So O’Grady told him, his mind half on that, half still in wonder at how his life had changed since this faerie had landed in it. How many eons of lying cold and afraid on this same bed after one of these dreams? Unable to even think clearly until he’d drunk quite a bit of brandy.

  And now he had this clever, loving partner. Picking through the still live strands of his dream. Helping O’Grady put it into perspective, returning steadiness and hope to his mind and peace to his body. Maeebsef listened closely, asking questions, fingers stroking his arms, as if brushing the memories from them.

  “Why did you think it might be today?”

  O’Grady stared into his drink. He had no reason to think so; he just had to get out. Not to get away from his partner, Maab knew he could spend every minute of his eternity with Maeebsef. But to give his body a rest from the constant demands being made upon it... He tried to think of an answer.

  But Maeebsef seemed to have forgotten the question, his mind occupied with other things. His hips wriggled a bit closer. The long white cock and sacs between Maeebsef’s legs swelling and darkening with blood, his hips beginning a slow undulation. Unbelievable. They’d made love for hours last night. And woken this morning rutting like animals. O’Grady still ached with it.

  He set his glass carefully on the nightstand. “It’s an unclear portent. They can be tricky,” he said truthfully.

  “How so?” Maeebsef’s question was absent, his fingers sliding across O’Grady’s thigh, now. His head turned to nuzzle and nip at the skin of O’Grady’s hip, sharp little sparks of pain. Then a long wet lick of hungry tongue.

  O’Grady shivered, his own hand reaching to capture and play with Maeebsef’s strong fingers. He leaned over and kissed Maeebsef’s head. “You’ll kill me,” he murmured into the silky strands of hair.

  Maeebsef slid off the bed and to the floor, strong hands on O’Grady’s knees, pushing them open. O’Grady sighed and let himself fall back, feeling the warmth as it climbed his inner thigh, working across the crease there, closing tight and determined over his cock. Which of course responded to Maeebsef’s hunger. As it always had, always would.

  He propped himself up on his elbows, watching the soft golden head moving and circling between his thighs. He got an occasional glimpse of the dark brows, purple eyes flashing up at him, then down again, the suction increasing. Maeebsef’s tongue like a wet anaconda sucking all the taste out of him, the lad humming now, growling in his throat. The pinprick heat of his teeth, just a hint and then gone. O’Grady gasped and bucked, feeling the heat rush into his balls, a surge of lava-like want.

  Maeebsef groaned happily around his cock, and O’Grady felt tight constriction that made him gasp as Maeebsef swallowed. Another prick of teeth, then a soft tug at his balls and O’Grady was crying out, thrusting into that suckling warmth. The tickle of fingers across his opening had him yelling, mind a blank, arching into it. Maeebsef swallowing avidly, taking him all in.

  O’Grady lay in shock, the ocean beating in his ears. Then Maeebsef appeared above him, mouth reddened, eyes blazing, chest heaving as his shoulder jerked. O’Grady found the strength to roll his glance downward in time to see Maeebsef’s arm moving, his hand pulling at his cock. The dark red head burst suddenly with ropes of white come, splattering across O’Grady’s abdomen and chest. Stinging hot and wet.

  “Gods,” sighed O’Grady, letting his head fall back. Maeebsef muttered something similar and collapsed across him.

  They lay like that. Until Maeebsef started to shiver again, that odd feverish chill that came upon him so often of late.

  “You’re cold,” said O’Grady, trying to rise to get Maeebsef a covering.

  “No. No. Don’t move. Let me
feel you.” Maebsef wrapped his arms around O’Grady, squeezing him so tightly the Banshee could barely breathe. He petted the shivering back, until Maeebsef released him and sat up, looking down with dark purple eyes. “You’re so beautiful,” whispered Maeebsef.

  The words blazed inside O’Grady’s heart like unexpected fireworks. Brilliant, wonderful. Maeebsef did not verbalize his sentiments as O’Grady was wont to. He showed by his actions what he felt. But now, a look of almost pain on his face, Maeebsef traced O’Grady’s damp muscles with one finger. “So beautiful… I hunger for you all the time, O’Grady.”

  O’Grady caught the hand in its path. “And I, you,” he said hoarsely. “As I will always.”

  “Yes.” That strained look in Maeebsef’s eyes evaporated. He smiled. “Always.”

  “Love you,” whispered O’Grady. Touching the captured hand with his lips, he gave a kiss to every fingertip. “Always.”

  ***

  LYRE

  The sheaves of ice over the shepherd’s pond looked like silvery gray mica, melting at the edges. Lyre stepped over the restraining barricade that kept the foolish humans from treading on thin ice and walked across the great misty expanse to the empty boathouse.

  The boathouse was closed now, during the cold months. But when it opened, it was a bright colorful pavilion full of humans and their children. Carts of pretzels and fluffed clouds of sugar on a stick. Ladies in bright dresses. People pointing their tiny silver cameras at each other. Lyre stepped closer and pressed his palm to one fogged pane of glass, rubbing it in a circle to clear a little looking portal, stooping to peer into the unused room.

  It was like looking into his own memories. Lyre had seen this room full of hanging paper lanterns, carts of wrapped flower bouquets, ladies in their long dresses rustling to and fro, slim hands in gloves holding handbags, the gentlemen in striped white summer jackets, jaunty straw hats and canes hanging from their arms. There had been, many, many years ago, a red and gilt painted instrument that wheezed and tooted and issued ridiculous melodies across the water that divided the boathouse from his home.

  His kind were curious. It was their greatest trouble. And the silly loping music had been what first attracted him. The music of the Gianes was beautiful. Ancient, meaningful, difficult and strange in its beauty. But what issued from the humans’ building was more like the trumpeting of a pachyderm. It appealed to the wondering child in him.

  He crept close enough to the building to see the machine which made the music, still taking care not to come too close to the humans. The taboos were numerous and complicated and he had always found it much simpler to just avoid contact altogether. He walked over a bridge that led to the little porch, jogging quickly by the few humans standing outside and slipping around the corner.

  “I beg your pardon.”

  Lyre collided full on with a human man standing just around the corner, almost falling, more from the fear than the impact, but strong hands grabbed his arms and held him upright. Lyre froze, unable to breathe, like a rabbit suddenly caught by a wolf.

  “Are you all right?” Sky blue eyes looked worried and apologetic behind glinting circles of glass. The hands still on him. Lyre would have pulled free, would have run off, but those eyes held him.

  He must be a sorcerer, Lyre had thought… Normal humans could not see folk unless one willed it. And no normal human had ever possessed a gaze that could reach through Lyre like a hand and grasp some tender self deep inside him.

  “What do you want?” he’d asked, full of fear.

  The sorcerer… flushed, and released him. Light flashed from the glass over his face as he stammered, “Terribly sorry… so clumsy… just be out of your way…” as if HE feared LYRE.

  It was charming, in the faeries sense, as in Lyre was charmed into stillness. He would remember the moment forever. Remember the music, its teasing, dancing bounce, and the flutter of the man’s long fingers, touching the lapel of his jacket. Ink stains on his fingers, and on his face. Lyre noted a bluish smudge near the man’s lips. Above those lips sat a slim blond mustache.

  The man’s murmured apologies dribbled off to silence. He gaped at Lyre, much as Lyre must have gaped at him. “Oh!” he said. And thrust out the ink-stained hand. “Joseph Sheehy-Skeffington.” He misunderstood Lyre’s silence. “Quite a mouthful, isn’t it? Er, my father was a feminist. That is…” Color rising from the starched collar to stain his neck, his cheeks.

  Lyre would remember the moment again and again. Going over and over it in his mind. Trying to understand what had made him do it. What had made him reach across an eon of taboos and clasp that hand in his own?

  “Lyre,” he’d told the man. “Of the Gianes.”

  ”Lyre!”

  Lyre jumped to the defensive. Back to the boathouse, hands up, shimmering a little with the protective glamour. “Who calls me?”

  Several yards away, he saw a Gianes female standing. Her face held the expression of barely masked disgust he had grown so accustomed to. Her arms crossed and chin tilted as if to avoid his presence, his smell. “You are wanted,” she called, voice full of distaste. She didn’t wait for a response, but whirled and walked off, leaving it up to Lyre to follow her or not.

  Lyre could read the female’s opinion of him in her back, her long strides, as if she hoped to lose Lyre somehow by walking quickly. He trotted behind her, following the familiar road, leading past the benches with their engraved plaques. Lyre’s eyes skipped over the plaques, the familiar inscriptions. He had read them again and again once. Waiting for him in their spot.

  “I’ll meet you there.”

  “Are you certain? I may be late. You’ll be waiting alone.”

  Silly, dear human. “I don’t mind being alone.”

  The heat in Joseph’s eyes was usually masked by the spectacles, but they were nose to nose now, his hands holding Lyre’s hips as if he would never release him. His breath on Lyre’s lips. “You should never be alone, my one.”

  Sad and funny, really, how alone Lyre truly was.

  They passed the last of the benches and a tiny dog sensed them and turned, barking, its human tugging at the leash in exasperation. They walked over the bridge, the soles of Lyre’s feet humming with magic as he crossed the water. Human voices came from below, echoing against the stone. He watched them as they emerged in their little boat, floating amongst the reeds and ducks, inexpertly rowing.

  In the older part of the Ramble, where the most revered families dwelt, his messenger paused. She crossed her arms and focused on some point above and beyond Lyre’s left shoulder. He knew better than to approach her, so he stood quietly waiting as well. After a respectable time, there was a distant bell, a rustling disturbance in the foliage around them, the last dead leaves breaking free; a breeze seeming to come from nowhere. It was his summons. Lyre stepped between and through and touched wood.

  A maid greeted him with nervous, downcast eyes. “You are expected,” he said, taking the card gingerly, as if it were infected with something.

  He was very formally dressed, in the older more conservative tradition. Beribboned and beaded long hair, the long, gauzy tunic over stockinged legs. Elegant embroidered boots with the exaggerated curved toes ending in bells.

  The hall to which Lyre was led to wait was traditional as well, and very expensive. Tall, ebony columns rose to the mauve tinted arched roof, which was illuminated, by hundreds of fireflies. Portraits, some moving, some still, lined the deep velvety moss walls. Archaic flute and pipe music seemed to be generated somewhere nearby.

  The maid reappeared. He bowed. Lyre bowed back, reflecting that this was the first civility anyone had bothered to tender toward him in quite some time. “Follow me,” said the maid, blinking huge green eyes at him, daring to meet his gaze.

  Ah. A curious one. They were almost worse than the ones who despised him. Lyre steeled his features to reflect nothing and nodded. Then he followed the maid to the great chamber.

  ***

  The tea
was set out, but May was too nervous to drink it.

  “Are you certain this is wise?”

  Her sister, who had arranged things, set down her teacup. “He is the one they suggested we send. He has … interacted with them before.”

  May looked nauseated. “My poor little boy.”

  “May, we don’t know that a human took Maeebsef. There are folk outside the Grove. He would have found shelter, I’m sure.”

  The two women’s eyes met, all the unspoken worry passing between them. The man they had summoned was banished. Allowed to live in the Grove, but not accepted. He worked for their legal system, to eke out a meager sustenance, but people of good society did not acknowledge him. Centuries of careful, correct behavior were threatened by letting him step into their home.