The Library at Mount Char Part 42

"OK," he said. "Fine."

"Mithraganhi might have looked like a child, but she wasn't."

"What, then?"

She rubbed her forehead. "I'm not sure. Not exactly. The records are lost, or maybe destroyed. But she was important. She was one of Father's key lieutenants. If she was still loyal to him-and there's no reason to think anything else-she might have found a way to bring him back."

"OK. All right. Fine. But...so what?"

Carolyn boggled at him, laughed a little. "We really are from different worlds, you know that?"

"Yes. Yes, that thought has crossed my mind once or twice as well. Can you maybe try to explain it to me? Small words?"

"Father was..." She trailed off, then laughed a little. "You know, I know literally every word ever spoken, but I can't think of a single one that's adequate to your question. Father was Father."

"That's not much help."

"I know." Carolyn held her hand up. "Give me a minute." She pinched her chin for several seconds, then looked up at him. "When one of my brothers was about nine, Father tasked him with convincing a Deep One to accept him as an apprentice."

"Deep One?"

"A giant squid. Sort of."

"Oh."

"Michael tried and tried, but the Deep One wouldn't go for it. Something to do with the Forest G.o.d, or maybe he just hated people. Probably that was the real lesson, but we still didn't understand how Father worked. We were young then. My brother tried to explain the situation, but Father wouldn't listen. He said my brother was 'not properly motivated.'" She shuddered.

"You OK?"

"I just-even hearing those words, you know? 'Not properly motivated.' I want to throw up."

"You can stop if you want."

"No. Thanks, but no. You need to understand this." She was looking up at the lights overhead. The iron was back in her voice.

"So...what happened?"

"He got a hot poker and burned out Michael's eyes."

"What? Jesus! He blinded the kid?"

"Yeah. Blinded him. Well-not the way you probably mean. Not permanently."

"How can that-"

"The white catalog, Jennifer's catalog, is medicine. Exotic medicine. None of our physical wounds were ever permanent. Father could heal anything. Jennifer was even better."

"That's convenient."

"Well...I suppose. Yes. It had its moments. But there are costs, too. Philosophical costs."

"Now I really don't understand."

Carolyn knelt at the puddle of the child's blood. Her back was to him, but the blood was still, not yet coagulated, shiny. He could see her face reflected in it. "It was different for us. For you, Americans, if things get bad enough...well. You always have an out."

"Suicide?"

"Death."

"But...you guys didn't?"

"No. Father burned Michael's eyes out. Every night, over and over. The rest of us had to attend him, had to watch. Each time took about twenty minutes-the first eye was quick, but after that Michael had to. To. To watch. One-eyed, you see. He'd watch as Father, um, Father, you know, heated the poker back up. The next morning Jennifer would grow them both back. Both eyes, you see. And then they'd do it again." The muscles of her back bunched and coiled like thick snakes under her robe as she spoke.

"What happened? How did it end?"

Carolyn snarled. In the puddle of child's blood Steve saw a flash of white teeth, reflected. "Michael became motivated." She spat the words out like someone vomiting up rotten food. "After eleven days of this my brother concocted a way to bow the Deep One to his will."

She was trembling. It crossed his mind to go to her, to touch her shoulders and offer comfort, but he didn't quite dare. "That's the worst thing I ever heard of."

"That," Carolyn said, "is Father. He wasn't even really angry. It was routine. Just a discipline thing. Do you see?"

Steve thought about it before he answered. "Yeah. Maybe I do. A little bit, anyway. And this kid, what's her name-Mythronnie?"

"Mithraganhi."

"She's buddies with this guy?"

"Well...she was."

Steve groaned, feeling sick. He went to the edge of the platform and looked down. "I went up to the top of the World Trade Center once," he said. "This is higher."

"Yes. A lot."

"Let's say I believe you. About the girl."

"Do you?"

"I don't know. Maybe. She looked harmless to me." He shrugged. "But I'm not used to being up this high. Maybe the rules are different up here. Are they?"

"I don't know that there are any rules," Carolyn said. "I won. That's the only rule I'm aware of."

"Why me?" He spoke softly. "Why am I here? I don't understand."

"You're a klutz, Steve. I needed someone to drop the magazine. I couldn't do it myself, couldn't even look at it. David might have seen it, in my mind."

"That's it? You expect me to believe that you dragged me into this because I'm clumsy? That's why you ruined my life?"

"Oh, you're exaggerating."

"EXA-" Steve cut himself off. Peace of mind is not the absence of conflict, but the ability to cope with it. That helped a little bit. "You f.u.c.king framed me for f.u.c.king murder, Carolyn, and then tried to get me eaten alive by wild dogs. Remember?" He patted Naga on the shoulders. "Naga remembers."

Naga shoulder-b.u.mped Steve in solidarity. The two of them glared at Carolyn.

"OK, fine, yes, there is a bit more to it than just that you're clumsy."

"Well. That's progress." He and Naga exchanged a glance. "Do, please, go on. Why me?"

"I'll explain. I really will. But first, I need to hang David." She wiggled the shoelace. Blackness had swallowed him completely, even his last hairy toe.

Steve felt his eyes go wide. The blackness around David had grown noticeably in just the last few minutes. Now, even from five feet away Steve felt the heat. It was like a furnace. He took a half step back. "What's happening to him?"

"Remember how I said he was frozen in time?"

"Uh...I guess." The blackness around David had a fluid quality, the surface swirling.

"And do you remember what he was doing when I froze him?"

"Is this a quiz?"

"More like a teaching method. You'll understand better if I pull it out of you. Do you remember?"

"Well...yeah, I guess. He was dying, right? And you'd just given him a little zap in the pain center of his brain. You said it was 'the theoretical upper limit of suffering.'" Then, under his breath, "I mean...d.a.m.n."

"Exactly. But here's the difference. Suffering-normal suffering-is transient. What we perceive as emotion is just a quick connection between three-dimensional s.p.a.ce and one of the higher physical planes-rage, joy, pleasure, whatever. The repercussions can echo for years, but the actual link usually only lasts for a fraction of a second." She gave her gargoyle smile again. "Usually."

"But...not this time?"

"Exactly." She jiggled the black sphere. "Time isn't pa.s.sing inside this. And I got it just right, too. David is connected to pure anguish, and he can't move on." She looked at Steve expectantly.

Steve thought about this for a good long while, then gave up. "Um. So what?"

"So," she said, "the potential energy between the planes will continue to be realized. It's like a capacitor with an infinite charge."

"Energy." He looked at David, now completely swallowed by blackness. The ball had grown visibly while they talked, and it was warmer now. "You mean, the black stuff? That's energy?"

"Exactly."

"How big will it get?"

"I'm not sure. A million miles, give or take. That's why we came up here. We need to set him in the heavens, where there's room."

"Come again?"

"By this time tomorrow, David will be our new sun."

III.

She reached into the cloud of stars overhead and made a shooing motion with her hand. The lights spun at her touch, not unlike the lazy Susan on the big corner table at a Chinese restaurant. When she had the right spot, she poked up a finger to stop the spinning, and pulled. s.p.a.ce rushed past them, the scale of the things they saw shrinking-first whole galaxies, then clouds, then individual stars, and finally planets. "Recognize that one?"

"Uh...Jupiter?" His lips felt numb.

"No, it's Saturn. See the rings?"

"Right. Saturn. That's what I meant."

"It's OK. Now, hush for a second. I need to concentrate."

Steve watched as she took David by the shoelace-only a few inches were still poking out-and pushed him gently through the thin membrane separating the reality Steve had grown up in and the Library. David seemed to shrink as he pa.s.sed through.

"There we go," she said, and dusted her hands off theatrically. "All done!"

"How long before he's the sun?"

"I'm not sure. At least a couple of hours. I'll come back and fix the orbits later. Can't have the wee little marbles b.u.mping into one another, can we?"

Steve, who was a plumber, spoke through dry lips. "No. I guess not. When does he turn bright and yellow?"

Her face fell, a little. "Well...he doesn't."

"What do you mean? He's going to stay like that? All black, like?"

"Yeah. It's a plane-of-anguish thing."

"Where will the light come from?"

She frowned. "There, ah, won't be quite as much. Light, I mean. Plenty of heat-anguish is very hot-and gamma radiation, and all of that, but there's not much for the visible spectrum."

"It's going to be dark all the time? Even when the sun's up? Forever?"

"It'll be warm enough," she said defensively. "No one will freeze. And people will adjust."

"Adjust."

She nodded. "You can adjust to almost anything."

Steve looked, but he couldn't find an answer in himself for that.

After a long time, Carolyn spoke again. "Well...that brings me to the other reason I brought you up here."

"The food?"