My entire troop was there, and though no one else wore a painted-on smile, they were all grinning and silly, and had been celebrating for a while. Shot glasses littered the glasstop table holding Chandra’s cake, and a full Scotch bottle was being passed from hand to hand, though it never seemed to empty. As with most drunken social gatherings, it wasn’t long before the universal, and unanswerable, questions began to fly.
Is there a God? Who’s right, the Creationists or Darwin? What is the human position in the Universe?
“What is it,” shouted Micah, staggering dangerously from his seven-foot height, “that makes the world go round?”
People began blurting their answers like they were blowing on party horns.
“Money!” Kimber said, and threw a wad into the air.
“Not true!” said Tekla, pointing a stern finger at her before toppling into a chair and passing out.
“Spoken like someone who has it,” Warren put in, slurring every syllable. He was dressed in his undercover bum attire, which he rarely wore in the sanctuary. He raised his arm in a silent toast when he saw me looking. He wasn’t holding a glass, though, because he didn’t have a hand.
I jumped, mouth falling open, but he shrugged and found a shot glass with his other hand. Draining whiskey, he then offered his own answer to the question. “Power runs this world, of course. People will spend their last dime to acquire it. Just look at me,” he said, spinning to show off his tattered trench.
“Power won’t satisfy you when you’re lying alone at night,” Felix said, one arm draped over Kimber’s shoulder, the other over Vanessa’s. “Sex rules the world, my friends. That’s why people want power. People want different sex, better sex, more sex. It’s the only valid reason to acquire money in the first place.”
“You’re all wrong.”
The place fell silent. A spotlight landed on Hunter. He was completely naked and totally aroused. Nobody commented, or even seemed to notice. They were as attentive as a roomful of reporters at a press conference, heads cocked in concentration as they tried to decipher his meaning. Vanessa had even taken out her pocket notebook, pen poised at the ready. But Hunter was staring straight at me, and he walked my way in a warrior’s beat, stopping so close I felt the heat of his breath on my lips.
“Love,” he said, putting a hand to my cheek, “is what makes this crazy world go round.”
Again, awareness that this was a dream washed over me-Hunter would never say that-but the kiss that followed certainly made my head spin. I reached out-wanting deeper, longer, more-but Hunter pulled back, palm on his lips, blinking rapidly as he looked back at me. Shocked, he whirled on his heel without another word, and the spotlight faded.
“What do you think, Jo-livia?”
I was still gazing after Hunter, who walked right through the pyramid wall and disappeared, and I had to work to turn my attention to Felix, and his unanswerable question. After a minute I shook my head. “I can’t remember.”
“That’s okay, babe,” he said, and he was suddenly standing before me, as near as Hunter had been when kissing me. I backed away. Felix and I weren’t close like that. We were only friends, and he knew it. One side of his mouth tilted in understanding. “Memories are just silent promises you once made to yourself. The moment is all that matters. Here.”
Chandra’s birthday cake suddenly appeared between us, Felix struggling to steady it on a silver platter more appropriate for medieval feasts and giant banquets. We balanced it between us, and approached Chandra, now seated on a throne and dais, the plastic silver crown lopsided on her head. When we came to a stop in front of her, she tilted her head to the other side, the soullessly blank eyes remaining fixed on me, that obscene smile never wavering.
“Make a wish,” she said, screwing up her lines…and doing it in the Tulpa’s voice. Then, just as I realized they were really sticks of dynamite, she extinguished those twenty-six candles. Blood coated my face and body, and with the heat of my father’s scorched laughter raining down on my shoulders, my dream blew up. I woke.
Screaming.
Sweating, I sat straight up in the rickety mine cart. My mouth was sandpaper dry, probably from breathing hard, though at least it was still dark and cool. I was back on the second floor, no longer lost in the stars.
“That’s odd.” Solange’s voice was tight. I swiveled to find her seated at a rough wood table, tweezers in one hand, a loupe in the other. She was frozen over a microscope, a bright lamp hanging from a ceiling rope and casting her honeyed skin lighter. The windows along the wall were muted, notable only against the inky blackness of the wall.
She still stared at me with dark, liquid eyes, though she’d changed into a pale strapless dress a shade lighter than her skin tone. Her feet were bare, toes peeking from beneath the silk folds, and her only adornment was still the gold earrings hanging like petite chandeliers, winking from her ears. She was also wearing a deep frown. “Diana was supposed to check for protective charms.”
And she rose like she was going to battle.
I scrambled to my feet, suddenly not wanting to be anywhere near her.
“I have to go.” I also had to pause to be sure my knees were steady before stepping over the cart’s side. Then I had to pause to be sure they were my knees. My unreasonable, if instinctive, fear was suddenly eclipsed. “What the…why the hell am I wearing chaps?”
“Shit-hot leather chaps,” Solange corrected, a smile broad in her voice. They were shit-hot. That and skintight, with studs securing them to my sides, and a woven belt with thick silver meshing that caught even the meager light. The mesh overlaid a batik-stamped pattern like a tiny chain-linked fence, and the result-though two-toned-was a complicated pattern that was both fierce and feminine.
It was echoed in the halter top.
I don’t do halter tops, I thought, though my cold dismay melded into horror as my eyes turned to my jewelry. I’d been wearing none upon entering the Rest House, but now I looked like some sort of Bedouin experiment gone bad. It wasn’t that the jewelry was ugly…there was just so much of it; armbands like thick silver snakes and wrists cuffed as if fettered with aged, thick silver and secured with a pin closure. I fingered heavy hoop earrings with a row of teardrops, and a choker that felt like a shackle. Rings studded every other finger in sharp points, more brass knuckles than ornamentation. I turned toward one of the windows to study my superimposed image…and found an entirely different person looking back at me.
My short black hair was slicked back and secured at the nape, with a single cornrow framing my face and threaded with silver. A rose the size of my palm was tucked behind my right ear, a bloodred punch against all the monochromatic costuming. It matched only my lips, currently drawn into a frown. The tar black shadow edging my eyes winged to my brow line.
Which also mirrored the black henna sunburst flaring from my now-pierced belly button. How long had I been out?
At least I still had my boots, I thought, sniffing. And the chaps were perfect for my knife harnesses. I caught myself halfway through this last thought and shook my head. A bell, apparently woven into my cornrow, jangled, further clearing my senses. “Where are my clothes?”
“By now? Probably incinerated. Don’t look at me,” Solange said when I spun back around. “Diana paid a visit while I was changing. There’s your wallet, by the way. Tell me, how do you feel?”
Like an odalisque escapee from a goth harem, I thought, gingerly touching my belly ring. But I had a feeling she wasn’t merely interested in my health. I was just happy she seemed to have calmed. Picking up my wallet, I returned it to my bag. Studying the rifled contents, I muttered, “They went through it.”
“Of course. They knew you wouldn’t just tell them who you are.”