“It would not do to appear to be too much of a cabal,” said the Scapula. “We wish to appear a popular groundswell.” He approached and bent over Fradi, examining his face searchingly. “This one is mouldering rapidly,” he called back over his shoulder, but then did a most unexpected thing. As he was straightening himself, he glanced back down at Fradi, and winked.
From the other side of the room Fradi could hear the sigh of air easing from soft leather cushions. “I use these divans while conferencing,” Vladimir said. “Shall I call for refreshments?”
“No time,” said the Scapula. “The schedule is exacting and Clara will await.” Fradi’s eyes were the largest bodily feature he had found to remain under his own voluntary control. Fortunately, involuntary functions such as breathing and the beating of his heart had continued with some regularity as well. Since he knew of many poisons that caused death by freezing these activities, this had scarcely been assured. He had even retained some vestige of decorum with the retention of muscle tone in assorted sphincters. But the eyes were what concerned him at the moment. By craning them as far as possible around to the sides of their orbits, and focusing his attention on his peripheral vision, Fradi could see the Scapula settling onto a couch placed at a right angle to that occupied by the reclining Lord of Storms. Perhaps it was the extreme angle, or even an incipient cataract in his eye, but a small fogbank appeared to be condensing over Vladimir’s head and extending itself along his body. The Scapula said, “Everything is ready?” as though he were asking himself a question, and then nodded in satisfaction as he answered himself in the affirmative; “Everything is ready.” Then the same cloud swirled out of the air over the Scapula’s head and spread out across his form like a caul.
I’d been here before. Not ‘here,’ this specific place, and even calling it a ‘place’ was misleading since as far as I could tell none of this had any basis in concrete external observable reality, but for all that it was a place, and was certainly of the same sort I had visited before, in Oolsmouth.
These conclaves of the gods, and for all I knew their whole system of communications, took place on a neutral common ground of artificial environments that existed - dreamlike - solely by mutual agreement. Since I still hadn’t experienced a dream worthy of the name, I was taking that part of the description on faith but without the slightest complaint. If Iskendarian wanted to monopolize the dreams to which our jointly held body was entitled, I was with him all the way. The deeper he chose to retreat into dreamland the happier I’d be.
That he was still around, however, was attested to by the fact that I was able to launch myself into the gods’ consensual fantasy-space, unless of course he’d abandoned our body while leaving his store of knowledge and practical techniques behind, buried somewhere in our shared unconscious. I wasn’t sure what I’d feel if he had cleared out - I doubted it would be as simple as noticing I was now rattling around in the equivalent of a large empty house formerly shared with a loud and demanding roommate - but I did have the (possibly fatalistic) idea that as soon as I thought he was gone and started to relax, that’s when he would really let me have it once and for all.
Of course, the last time I’d hit the conclave circuit I’d been going as part of a group; this time I was solo. I still didn’t know what Gash intended to do, which I’m sure wasn’t accidental on his part, and if anyone knew if I’d be meeting up with any of my other pals it sure wasn’t me. If I could have figured out how to nose around while not actually attending - eavesdropping with one foot out the door, so to speak - I’d have done that instead, but aside from the vague assurance in the back of my mind that I could do that if I was smart enough I couldn’t dredge up the information that would tell me how to bring it about. Instead, I found myself retracing familiar ground: the cloud above my head, the drawing-down finger motions in front of my face, the clammy tendrils of fog creeping down my back and across my body and into my ears; the feeling that even though I didn’t consciously know what I was doing, it was familiar, and I might as well just give myself up to it and let whatever was in control have its rein.
I wasn’t sure where Gash had taken himself off to this time. Jill either, for that matter. We’d considered going back to her place in lieu of the availability of another base of operations, but when I’d told him I had it in my mind to attend the Scapula’s proclamation but wasn’t happy with the idea of leaving my insensible body lying around where she’d have easy access to it he’d reluctantly revealed that, indeed, he had his own small retreat down a convenient byway. His retreat proved in fact to be a walk-up apartment above a laundry and an eggroll shop in a seedy quarter not far off the Boulevard of Gods. On unlocking the door, he’d cast me a severe gaze, as though daring me ever mention this to anyone else, before leading the way up the stairs.
The flat wasn’t shabby, exactly, but it was clear he hadn’t had anyone in to pick up for a while. I even considered - very briefly - suggesting that perhaps he could set up some arrangement with the laundryman underfoot. I’d quashed the idea as soon as it had manifested, though. Circumstances had thrown me closely together with Gash but they hadn’t made us close, if you follow my meaning, or at least close enough for me to be giving him the sort of critique bandied about by bachelor gentlemen of whatever social stratum. Perhaps the suggestion that I raise the topic had floated up from Iskendarian, in an attempt to get me pummeled and thus let him loose, but I didn’t take that idea too seriously; I knew full well how creatively I could get myself in trouble with no need of external assistance.
In any case, after rummaging around for a bit Gash had produced a carafe of iced tea from his chiller, and I’d joined him in a glass before being shown back to the armchair in the front room. “Do you think this is a good idea?” I’d asked him.
He’d shrugged. “There are arguments on every side. That is why I am still considering whether or not to join you. Are you sure you can handle it?”
“Hell,” I’d said, “I’m not sure of anything. All I know is that I did this before without our pal popping out, and there’s nothing else on the schedule that has the potential of shifting the rules like this bit with the Scapula.”
So here I was now, in the logical sequela to that argument, synchronizing into the arrival zone of... the crater of an active volcano? I’d never visited one that I could remember, you understand, but it still had all the hallmarks: a wide bubbling lake of glowing red magma, with burps of semi-solid rock jetting into the air here and there across its surface; a sensation of baking heat billowing from the cauldron in waves; the scents of brimstone and rotten eggs; a rumbling and quaking underfoot; inclined rock walls reaching jaggedly toward the heavens on all sides, excepting only the large flattish space I found myself at one edge of; even the arcs of lightning that sparked from the molten rock to the low-riding clouds and back on a continual crackling basis. Of course, the typical volcano lacked some of the amenities this one provided: the comfortable lounging chairs and settees arranged in conversational groupings around the undulating coffee tables; the strolling instrumentalists and wait-persons and -things; and, of course, the crowds of gaily dressed folks standing around gossiping while ostentatiously ignoring the spectacular view. I looked for a ambulating palm tree but instead spotted a whole grove of them holding court off at the far side, checked for the raffish piratical aspect favored by Phlinn Arol, but without success, and finally decided to make a swing past the virtual sideboard on my way to join the hippogriff who was telling obviously hilarious jokes to his audience of two humans in jewels and ermine, an ostrich, a toad as tall as the ostrich, and a cloud of sparkling dust.