She wished Thendard would shut up. The end of the hunt was near; the animal moved on shaky legs, and its sides heaved. Finally it turned, at bay in an angle of the nexus.
A muscular, swag-bellied woman darted in, teeth snapping. The animal twisted to meet the attack, and a second bulky woman rushed in, bit into the animal's ham. It tried to shake her off, but she clung, jaws working. Blood sprayed her face, then the animal's hindquarters collapsed. Two more pack members dove in and seized the animal's throat.
It was over, and the pack fought over the corpse, whooping and elbowing. Genoaro seemed to hang back, along with several of the smaller men. Avidity and uncertainty warred in Genoaro's face.
Cayten felt the call of the animal's flesh, longed to taste the blood. Some part of her was horrified, but she pushed past Thendard's arm, out into the bright light of the nexus.
"Genoaro," she called, approaching the kill.
"A dozen bloody faces lifted up from the animal's open belly, and lips writhed back from white teeth.
"What do you want?" The big woman's voice was an unsteady warble. She giggled, but the sound held more menace than humor. Cayten saw that she affected a blind eye, a disk that shone dead white in the pink blaze of the lights. The woman's lower jaw was huge; she looked as if she could easily break bones between those teeth.
Cayten recognized her, quite suddenly. She was Shinvel Dward, an influential critic of Bo'eme, specializing in domestic art forms. She had publicly praised Cayten's work on several occasions, and come to Cayten's last opening, dressed modishly and escorted by two beautiful young bond servants. Cayten tried to connect that memory to the naked beaster who now glared at her, and grew dizzy. Dward's stance seemed terribly threatening; Cayten had an urge to fawn, as though the woman were her superior in some clear but unidentifiable way. She bowed her head.
Dward snorted. "Join us," she finally said. "But wait your turn."
The beasters returned to their feast, ignoring Cayten.
Genoaro watched Cayten with eyes that seemed to contain no humanity at all. "What did you expect to find here?" he asked finally.
She had no answer. The feeding beasters slowed, the first edge of appetite blunted, and Genoaro sank to his knees by the corpse, and began to tear at it with his teeth.
Cayten observed him dispassionately, as though she watched from a dream. She compared this scarlet-faced creature with the man whose hands had once touched her so sweetly, so intimately. The influence of the skein faded in her mind, until it no longer seemed important. She reached behind her neck and switched off the skein, and found herself on a bloody steel killing ground, in the company of human horrors. She turned away, abruptly sick.
Thendard guided her from the nexus, before he reactivated her skein, at minimal function. "I thought I warned you," he said. "Never switch out while you're still on the Level; it takes time to come up from the hindbrain. You want to do that when you're back in Bo'eme. Decompress slowly. Besides, the lawmechs will stun you if they don't pick up a skein signature from you. Got to run the skein when you're on the Level. The beasters despise tourists; even the beaster tourists feel that way."
"Take me home," she muttered.
Genoaro was gone for two days, and when he came home, he stank of death and sex. She could not speak to him, nor would he look at her. She went to her own studio and immersed herself in her work and did not see him for another day.
She was working on a tall, graceful goblet, glazing the spidery porcelain armature with tiny flecks of corundum. The goblet depicted a pastoral scene, ruby horses running on a field of aquamarine under sapphire skies. She lifted each bit of gemstone into place with a fine-tipped brush, fused it to the porcelain with a needle of coherent light. The process demanded so much concentration that she didn't notice Genoaro until he spoke.
"Beautiful," he said.
She turned to look at him. His face was still drawn with fatigue, and taut with some deeper strain. A muscle jumped under his left cheekbone. But his eyes seemed to belong to him again, as though the Genoaro she knew had returned.
He stood at her door, leaning against the frame, his hands thrust deep in his pockets. "I'm sorry," he said.
She believed him, with a sudden rush of relief. She laid aside her brush and laser; then she went to him.
He held her so tight that her ribs creaked and she could not breathe. She held still for a long moment, but then fear licked at her, just a little, and she pushed at him. He didn't seem to notice at first, but then he released her and stepped back.
"I'm sorry," he said again, and his face was so full of confusion and pain that she put her arms around him and held him as hard as she could.
Genoaro's furnaces were cold, and for several days he did not light them. He moved about the studio like a ghost, face gray, body slumped into a defeated shape. Cayten had no words of comfort to give him. When she tried to speak of pleasantly trivial things, he listened with a look of grim patience.
On the third day, she found him by his furnaces, warming a pot of cloudy green soda glass. His face was sharp with intent.
"You're going back to work?" She felt a warm rush of relief.
He smiled tautly. "Well, I'll try."
A week passed, and another. Genoaro worked with a strangely fierce concentration, as if he were determined to build from his labors a refuge of some sort. He seemed to be willing himself into thoughtless exhaustion. At first Cayten welcomed his absorption as a sign of returning normality, but after a while she found it increasingly disturbing.
He was always in his studio, not even pausing to take meals with her. His face grew more drawn with each day that passed, until he wore a look of constant haggard desperation.
When she asked him what was wrong, he shook his head and said, "I've gotten behind, Cayten. I'll have to work very hard for a while, or I'll lose too many clients."
"Genoaro... they'll make allowances."
He darted a hot glance at her. "I don't want anyone to make allowances."
She couldn't understand his anger.
She never found a way to discuss the Level with him, though she tried more than once. Each time she mentioned the Level to Genoaro, he turned the subject away, as if it were a dagger she had thrust at him. Finally he shouted at her. "That's over, Cayten! You do me no good bringing it up, making me think about it. You can help me most if you never mention the Level again."
"I won't, then," she said, though she wondered if it was the right thing to do.
One day soon after, a Linean came to their door to fetch a work it had commissioned.
The alien, a rotund blue batrachian creature, lifted the brown glass poniard from its velvet-lined presentation case. "Fine work," it grunted, as it turned the edge so that the blade threw a delicate glitter into Cayten's eyes.
"Thank you," Genoaro said stiffly, waiting impatiently for the Linean to finish its examination.
Acting on a sudden impulse, Cayten spoke. "Kingly one," she said - that being the proper term of respect for a Linean of elevated rank. "May I ask for whom the poniard is intended?"
Genoaro glared at her, shaking his head. But the Linean responded courteously. "One of our elder diplomats soon will retire."
She ignored Genoaro's obvious displeasure, and spoke again. "A lovely gift to commemorate your honored person's service, then."
The Linean shook its greasy blue head. "No gift. With this will we cut the honored person's aged throat, it being essential to demonstrate the proper respect."
She drew back, still smiling, though she was sure her smile had gone as glassy as the poniard.
When the Linean was gone, Genoaro looked at her wordlessly.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"It doesn't matter," he said, turning away. "You know what sort of work I do."