The bureaucrat found Chu behind the bandstand, hustling a red-faced young roisterer. She leaned against him, one palm casually resting on his rump, and teased a paper cup from his hand. “No, you don’t need any more of that,” she said patiently. “We can find better uses for—” The bureaucrat backed away unnoticed.
He let the crowds sweep him down the main street of a transformed Rose Hall, past dance stands, rides, and peepshows. Pushing through a cluster of surrogates — kept to the fringes since they weren’t physically present — he watched the fantasia presentations for a time, shoved up against the stage with a rowdy group of soldiers with central evac armbands who hooted, whistled, and cheered on their favorites. The event was too esoteric for his offworld tastes, and he drifted on, through the odors of roast boar, fermented cider, and a dozen fairy foods.
Children materialized underfoot and, laughing, were gone.
Somebody hailed him by name, and the bureaucrat turned to face Death. Flickering blue light showed through the sockets of the skull mask, and the bureaucrat could see between metal ribs through to the cape. Death handed him a cup of beer.
“And who are you?” he said, smiling.
Death took his elbow, strolled him away from the bright center of the celebration. “Oh, do let me have my mysteries. It’s jubilee, after all.” The tattered black cape Death wore smelled musty; the costumier had taken advantage of his distant customer’s limited senses. “I’m a friend, anyway.”
They came to a footbridge over the little stream marking the end of town. The light here faded to gloom, and the clustered buildings were silent and oppressively dark. “Have you located Gregorian yet?” the surrogate asked.
“Just who are you?” the bureaucrat asked, not smiling.
“No, of course you haven’t.” Death looked to the side distractedly. “Excuse me, somebody’s just… No, I don’t have time to… Okay, just leave it right there.” Then, directly again. “I’m sorry about that. Listen, I don’t have the time, I’m afraid. Just tell Gregorian, when you find him, that someone he knows — his sponsor, tell him that his old sponsor will take him in again, if he gives up this folly. Do you understand? That’s what you want too, isn’t it?”
“Maybe it isn’t. Why don’t you tell me who you are and what you actually want, and maybe we can work together on this.”
“No, no.” Death shook his head. “It’s a long shot, anyway,
probably won’t work. But if you have trouble dealing with him, it’s an argument you can use. I mean it, he’ll know that my word is good.” He turned away.
“Wait,” the bureaucrat said. “Who are you?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you his father?”
Death turned to look at him. For a long moment it said nothing; then, “I’m sorry. I have to leave now.” The surrogate swayed as if about to fall, and then locking gyros froze into place and it stood there, a statue.
He touched the metal skull. It was inert, lacking the almost subliminal hum of an active unit. Slowly he walked away, turning now and again to look back, but it remained dead.
In the thick of things again, he drained off his spiced beer and picked up a powdered fairy cruller from a drunken teenager who waved away his money: “It’s been paid for!” There was a banner on the stand reading tidewater produce and animal by-products collective. He raised the pastry in toast, and wandered into the fairway again, feeling distant and a trifle wistful. All these happy people.
The crowd swirled about him, as changing-unchanging as waves crashing on the beach, endlessly fascinating even as the eye grabs and fails to comprehend. Faces contorted with laughter that was too shrill, too manic, skin too flushed, beaded with sweat. What am I doing here? the bureaucrat asked himself. I’m not going to accomplish anything tonight. The forced gaiety depressed him.
The evening was growing late. The children had evaporated, and the adults remaining were louder and drunker. Sucking powdered sugar from his fingers, the bureaucrat almost stumbled into a brawl. Two drunks were pushing a surrogate around, flattening its ribs and ripping off its arms and legs one by one. The thing struggled on the ground, protesting loudly as they tore off its last remaining limb, then went dead as the operator gave up on the evening as a bad cause. The bureaucrat skirted the laughing spectators and continued down the road.
A woman in a green-and-blue fantasia, Spirit of the Waters perhaps, or Sky and Ocean, emerald plumes flying up from her headdress, came toward him. Her costume was cut low, and she had to hold up the spangled skirt with one hand to keep it from brushing the ground. The crowd parted like water before her, cleaved by an almost tangible aura of beauty. She looked straight at him, her eyes blazing green as the soul of the forest. Nearby, a chanteuse sang that the heart was like a little bird, looking for a nest. She set the crowds swirling like brightly painted metal bobbins. The green woman was swept to him, a mermaid cast up by the sea.
Automatically the bureaucrat took a step backward to let this vision by. But she stopped him with a touch of one green leather glove. “You,” she said, and those green eyes and crisp white teeth seemed about to tear into him, “I want you.”
She put an arm about his waist and led him away.
By the edge of the jubilee the woman paused to pluck a waxflower from one sagging string. She cupped it in both hands, and bent at stream’s edge to place it in the water. Other flowers bobbed and whirled on the stream, spinning slowly, a stately ballroom dance.
As she crouched over the sphere of light, he saw that her arms above the gloves were covered with stars and triangles, snakes and eyes, gnostic tattoos of uncertain meaning.
Her name, she said, was Undine. They strolled down Cheesefac-tory Road beyond the ruck of houses, deep into a forest of roses. Thorny vines were everywhere; they climbed pillars formed by trees that had been choked by their profusion, sprawled along the ground, exploded into bloodspeckled bushes large as hills. The air was heavy with their scent, almost cloying. “I should have trimmed these back some,” the woman said as they ducked under a looping arch of the small pink flowers. “But so close to the jubilee tides, who’d bother?”
“Are these native?” asked the bureaucrat, amazed at their extent. The flowers were everywhere he looked.
“Oh, no, these are feral Earth stock. The original industrielle had them planted along the roadside; she liked their look. But without any natural enemies, they just exploded. This extends, oh, kilometers around. On the Piedmont they’d be a problem; here, the tides will just wash them away.”
They walked some way in silence. “You’re a witch,” the bureaucrat said suddenly.
“Oh, you’ve noticed?” He could feel her amused smile burning in the night air beside his face. The tip of her tongue touched the edge of his ear, gently traced the swirls down into its dark center, withdrew. “When I heard you were looking for Gregorian, I decided to have a look at you. I studied with Gregorian when we were children. Ask me anything you want.” They came to a clearing in the rosebushes, and a small unpainted hut. “Here we are.”
“Will you tell me where Gregorian is?”
“That’s not what you want.” That smile again, those unblinking green eyes. “Not at the moment.”
“This must have a thousand eyelets,” he said, clumsily unhooking the back of the fantasia. A slice of flesh appeared just below the downy nape of Undine’s neck, widened, reached downward. The tips of his fingers brushed pale skin, and she shivered slightly. A single waxflower burned on a nightstand beneath a sentimental holo of Krishna dancing. The flame leaped and fell, throwing warm shadows through the room. “There. That’s the last of them.”