Kaiku was plainly taken by the atmosphere of the place, even before the Summer Wind had creaked into its bay and the mooring lines were thrown to the men on the dockside. Such a short divide from the mainland, and yet even a stranger could tell at a glance that things were done a different way here on Fo. Asara had been here many times before, and always disliked it for the very reasons that appealed to Kaiku. It was peaceful in Pelis, and peace meant boredom to Asara. She looked forward to moving on, into the wilder parts of Fo, where life was not so easy.
Once disembarked, Asara declared that she would find them passage north tonight, and they would leave in the morning if they could. She advised Kaiku to buy herself a rifle; she would need protection where they were going. Kaiku was excited at the thought. She had always been an excellent markswoman, and recent events had meant that she had slipped out of practice. She and Tane went off to buy supplies and weaponry. Asara was left alone, as she liked it.
It was an easy matter to get them a ride on a trade caravan going to Chaim. Her previous visits had taught her who to go to, though she looked radically different now than she did then, and nobody recognised her. Only one caravan was departing in the morning, but it was well-guarded enough and suitable to their needs. She approached the caravan master as he was overseeing the loading of the cargo. He gave them a very good price for passage. It was so easy to manipulate men, looking as she did. She was coldly aware of the effect her beauty had on the male mind. She went through the motions of flirtatiousness, bored inside, executing a sequence of smiles, laughs, tilts of her body, small touches. Her victim's arousal was plain on his face. Sometimes the sequence took a little tailoring to suit the individual, but usually not. She sighed to herself as she walked away, the agreement done. What brainless animals men were: like dogs, simple to train, begging for treats, eager in heat and appetite. She had little enough respect for anyone – with a few notable exceptions – but at least most women had some modicum of dignity. Men were just embarrassing.
Her transaction done, she met up again with Tane and Kaiku, who informed her of the inn they had found where they would all be staying. Asara knew it well, and it was a safe choice. She told them to go back and rest; she had some business to conclude before retiring. They accepted her explanation, knowing better than to pry. There had been questions on their journey: where were the burns she had suffered; why did she look different? More gratifying was Tane's shock when she appeared on the deck of the barge with short sleeves, and he saw that the tattoo of the Messengers' Guild that had run the length of her inner arm was now only a dark smear like a bruise. The next day it was gone entirely. She gave them no answers. She was not a freak for their curiosity.
She walked the town while the inky shadows of night seeped through the narrow, picturesque streets. Aurus and Neryn shared the sky, the vast pearl moon and her tiny green sister. Iridima, the brightest, was not to be seen; her orbit took her elsewhere, it seemed. In the pale, green-hued glow, Asara wandered down lantern-lit lanes, killing time. She passed a street of bars and restaurants, silhouettes moving in the windows as conversation and laughter drifted out; but it all seemed alien to her, and made her feel unaccountably lonely. This place was possessed of a wonderfully historic charm, with its balconies and coiled-metal railings and uneven alleyways, but it did not have the power to touch Asara.
Gradually, the town of Pelis gentled itself to sleep. She waited, patient as a spider. She had already chosen her prey for the night, spotted him waddling home, puffing at the exertion of hauling his fat frame up the sloping cobble streets. Usually she preferred women – the sensuous curves of their bodies, their fragrance appealed to her – but her encounter with the caravan master had given her a perverse desire for someone bloated and disgusting. He was a fishmonger, by the smell of him, and he lived in an unremarkable corner house of a quiet street. Usually she would have spent more time studying him before she struck – ensuring that he lived alone, observing his habits – but tonight she would have to allow herself a little recklessness. There was no telling when she might next get a chance, and the need was pressing at her.
Her rifle she had stashed underneath a row of bushes; it would only get in her way here. She haunted the street until she was sure that nobody was observing her, and then crossed to the wall of the house and pressed herself flat against it. The ground floor was secure, but on the second storey the shutters were open to let the summer night breezes blow through the house. Asara tested the texture of the wall. It was of local stone, rough and weathered, and it provided more than enough handholds for her.
She took a final look about and then climbed. In four swift movements she had scaled up to the window-ledge, where she looked inside. The room beyond was bright with green-edged moonlight, and cluttered with the fishmonger's voluminous clothes, heaped untidily about the tiled floor. It was simple and sparse, built to be cool and airy to combat the heat. The fishmonger himself was a mountain of flesh on a mat in one corner, rolled on his side with his back to her, half covered by a thin sheet. His shoulders, dusted with curls of hair, rose and fell as he slept. She slipped inside, over the ledge and on to the floor without a sound.
She padded silently towards him, glancing warily at the dark, uncurtained doorway leading into the rest of the house. When she reached the edge of his sleeping-mat, she straightened and brushed her hair back behind her ear, looking down on him. She could smell the acrid night-sweat rising from his skin, pungent with the scent of the fish he had eaten and handled. And something else too, another faint smelclass="underline" perfume, and coitus. Her eyes fell to the shallow depression in the mat next to his bulk, too small and light to have been made by him.
She whirled just as the woman appeared at the doorway, returning from whatever nocturnal desires had made her get up. She was dressed in a simple grey nightgown, her black hair tangled and her eyes muzzy with sleep. For the briefest of instants, she froze as she saw Asara standing over her lover; then she screamed.
Asara was on her in an eyeblink. She lashed a kick across the woman's face, sending her spinning in a whirl of hair and arms to crash into the wall and collapse. Whether dead, unconscious or only stunned, Asara had no more time to deal with her. The fishmonger was scrambling off the bed, crabbing away from her frantically on his heels and elbows, a small cry of bewilderment and alarm coming from his lips. She pinned him down with a hand to his flabby throat and trapped his arms with her knees; he was too slow to resist, and by the time he realised what she had done, it was too late. She sat on the rise of his hairy belly, feeling his legs kick uselessly behind her, trying to get a knee up into her ribs but foiled by the gut in between. She took a glance over at the woman, still slumped against the wall, her face covered by her hair. Then she returned her attention to the fishmonger, who was flailing ineffectually beneath her even though he was easily double her weight. His faint cries were strangled by her grip. His eyes bulged in fear.
'Shh,' she said softly. 'I only want a kiss.'
She moved her lips to his as fast as a snake taking a mouse, and sucked.
The fishmonger went rigid as something seemed to tear inside him, something not physical, and gush out through his mouth and into hers. It glittered, this thing, and sparkled; a rushing, bright stream that flickered between their lips as she robbed it from him. For a few long seconds, he felt as a ghost must, fading in the rays of the dawn; and then the horror in his eyes waned, and his pupils grew dark and dim, and his body relaxed in death. Asara let him go with a gasp, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. His head smacked hard against the tiled floor with a nauseating sound. She took a few heavy breaths in and out, relishing the swelling warmth inside her, and then she got off him.