to glow, the shadows of two grotesque caricatures of people walked across it as if their joints had been broken, then began to talk to each other. One looked like Bogrevil. He could hear the shadows speaking, but it was gibberish. Somehow, though, he knew the story being told, knew what they were going to do. He watched, laughed at humor that eluded him, and was stabbed by sadness at tragedy he didn’t comprehend. She spoke then, the sphinx, despairing. “You know this story?” He nodded, still watching, though he couldn’t think of its name. “I played so small a part,” she bemoaned. “But if my role were larger, then we should not have met at all in this place.” He couldn’t fathom that. “It wants music,” she commented. “That will come soon enough, I know.” Her voice broke.
He turned back to her, his heart wrenched by the sound of her weeping. Tears flowed to her paws, and dripped off the claws. He cupped his hands until they were full, and her image rippled in the held pool. He couldn’t understand how, when everything was dark around her, she continued to glow as if in soft bluish moonlight.
He raised his hands and drank her tears as if he might absorb her grief. When he opened his eyes, she was receding, though neither of them seemed to be moving at all.
“Sleep, my darling,” she said, and he knew the voice at last though he hadn’t heard it for such a long time: She hadn’t become a merwoman at all. She’d changed into this doleful manticore. “Sleep,” she said again and though he wanted to run and embrace her and never let her go this time, he could only watch her shrink into the distance, a source of retreating light that filled in with black despair and was soon gone altogether.
He turned back to the play, but the booth was closed, the screen covered; then the remaining light dimmed and the booth also disappeared. Everything was dark now, and he was alone, floating, a mask on the waves, free of anguish, of pain, of the helplessness of his life, and he released himself to the will of the black water as it carried him away. Out to sea, he hoped.
When he awoke he didn’t at first know where he was. His mind was confused, jumbled. Candles burned nearby, reflected in the white bone of the tusk-like tines above him, making them seem to dance as the candle flames flickered. He was in a bed, but the sides of it were higher than he. It was a box, really, a shallow box; and not far away stood a towering brass water pipe.
Then he remembered, and he knew what had been done to him, but he was so drained of emotion, of fear, anger, that he didn’t react to the knowledge, only contemplated it as if the emotions belonged to some other person.
Eskie should be coming for him soon. She would help him back to the dormitorium, put him to bed, and later bring him some broth, something to revive him. That sounded very appealing. He realized that he was ravenously hungry. Now he understood why the boys let themselves be chosen, even fought for the privilege of service. Already he wanted to be with the sphinx again, to hear her voice, his mother’s voice; he needed to tell her that he loved her and wouldn’t let them throw her into the sea this time. No, he would cling to her as she moved into darkness, wrap his arms around her neck, and climb upon her back and ride her so that she couldn’t disappear.
He licked his lips. They were dry, and licking them made them sticky. He remembered again that he was hungry.
After a while he crawled from the box on his own. No one remained in the chamber. The blindfold lay curled on the floor beside the pipe as if for the next client. He stood, swaying, and placed his hands on the belly of the pipe to steady himself. It was cold, and when he drew his hand away, his palm was imprinted with the designs etched in the bronze. He rapped his knuckles against it to listen to the sound echo inside. What did that do to the afrit? he wondered. Did it slumber after it had drunk of someone like him? Did it hear him? Know he was out here? He’d have liked to communicate with it, if only