Ariel by Steven R. Boyett Page A
Authors: Steven R. Boyett
Tags: Fiction, General, Science-Fiction, Romance, Fiction - Fantasy, Fantasy, Fantasy - Contemporary, Contemporary, Paranormal, Magic, Fantasy - General, Science Fiction And Fantasy, Regression (Civilization), unicorns
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foulest of masters By his loins, By his blood, By his damned soul, To come forth. "I order thee By all the unholy names: Lucifer, Satan, Beelzebub, Belial, Shai-tan, Mephistopheles, Thy hair, thy heart, Thy lungs, thy blood, To be here To work your will Upon me."
He closed the book.
Ariel still wouldn't meet my eyes. "'To work your will upon me'?" I whispered. "Ariel, how could you?"
A ripple flowed down her flank. "I had to know. I'm sorry, but I had to know if I could beat it."
"You're sorry! That conjuration practically offers my life if a demon comes!"
She lowered her head until her horn almost touched the floor. When she raised it again there was a crystal-bright streak beneath each ebony eye. Tears stung in my own eyes at the sight. "Oh, Pete," she said softly. In her voice I heard that lost-little-girl voice from when I first met her, saying "bwoke" with such hurt pleading. "I was much younger then, and foolish. It was done from my ignorance and insecurity. I never meant to play games—stupid games—with your life, Pete. You know that."
"I thought I knew that." I was numb inside.
"Pete! You don't mean that." She looked in desperation at Malachi. "Why did you have to tell him?"
Calmly: "He deserved to know. You should have been the one to tell him."
"It was stupid; it was a stupid thing for me to do!" She stepped toward me but I held up a hand.
"No. I . . . think I'll take a walk or something. I want to be alone." I wanted so much to say that yes, it was okay, it was no big deal, of course I loved her. But I couldn't, not the way I felt then. It wasn't so much that she'd used me, but that she'd never told me.
She was still talking, but she sounded far away. The walls closed in on me; I wanted out.
"Pete, please! It was long ago; I was still growing up. I didn't understand what any of it meant."
I paused at the door. "You still could have told me." I turned to go out the door.
Everything happened with horrifying suddenness, but with the slow motion of a dream. It felt choreographed, executed with precision timing. I grabbed the knob and turned it. Behind me Malachi yelled "No !" and I thought, fuck you, you can't make me stay, and I opened the door. I looked back as I did, just in time to see a white blur as Ariel cleared the space from the living room to the front door in one leap. With a movement almost too fast to follow she twitched her head, batting at something with her horn. I started to wonder what she was trying to do. The thought never had time to complete itself because a muscular giant buried a sharpened pickaxe in the middle of my back.
I looked down at myself as I fell. Something protruded from my stomach. I wondered what it was, but was interrupted by the distant thump of my body hitting the front porch.
Gee , I thought, it doesn't even hurt .
A giant black heel came down from the sky and blotted out the sun.
Six
Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide in thy crib? Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrows? or will he harrow the valleys after thee? Wilt thou trust him because his strength is great? or wilt thou leave thy labour to him? Wilt thou believe him, that he will bring home thy seed, and gather it into thy barn?
—Job, 39: 9-12
It was dark out there.
That's all I remember thinking for a long time, that it was dark out there, that I was at the bottom of an ocean of black water and was fighting my way up to distant daylight. It was formless black and stagnant, no eddies or swirls.
Starless , I thought. Starless and Bible black .
I couldn't feel anything. Why couldn't I feel anything?
Because someone stuck a giant hypo in your back and shot you full of Novocain. Whole body. Numb. Numbnumbnumbnumb.
Oh, yeah. It's frightening to walk in the dark if you can't even feel your way around. What did that remind me of? Oh, sure. "The Pit and the Pendulum." Good old Poe.
Was there some deeper hole out there in that blackness, waiting
He closed the book.
Ariel still wouldn't meet my eyes. "'To work your will upon me'?" I whispered. "Ariel, how could you?"
A ripple flowed down her flank. "I had to know. I'm sorry, but I had to know if I could beat it."
"You're sorry! That conjuration practically offers my life if a demon comes!"
She lowered her head until her horn almost touched the floor. When she raised it again there was a crystal-bright streak beneath each ebony eye. Tears stung in my own eyes at the sight. "Oh, Pete," she said softly. In her voice I heard that lost-little-girl voice from when I first met her, saying "bwoke" with such hurt pleading. "I was much younger then, and foolish. It was done from my ignorance and insecurity. I never meant to play games—stupid games—with your life, Pete. You know that."
"I thought I knew that." I was numb inside.
"Pete! You don't mean that." She looked in desperation at Malachi. "Why did you have to tell him?"
Calmly: "He deserved to know. You should have been the one to tell him."
"It was stupid; it was a stupid thing for me to do!" She stepped toward me but I held up a hand.
"No. I . . . think I'll take a walk or something. I want to be alone." I wanted so much to say that yes, it was okay, it was no big deal, of course I loved her. But I couldn't, not the way I felt then. It wasn't so much that she'd used me, but that she'd never told me.
She was still talking, but she sounded far away. The walls closed in on me; I wanted out.
"Pete, please! It was long ago; I was still growing up. I didn't understand what any of it meant."
I paused at the door. "You still could have told me." I turned to go out the door.
Everything happened with horrifying suddenness, but with the slow motion of a dream. It felt choreographed, executed with precision timing. I grabbed the knob and turned it. Behind me Malachi yelled "No !" and I thought, fuck you, you can't make me stay, and I opened the door. I looked back as I did, just in time to see a white blur as Ariel cleared the space from the living room to the front door in one leap. With a movement almost too fast to follow she twitched her head, batting at something with her horn. I started to wonder what she was trying to do. The thought never had time to complete itself because a muscular giant buried a sharpened pickaxe in the middle of my back.
I looked down at myself as I fell. Something protruded from my stomach. I wondered what it was, but was interrupted by the distant thump of my body hitting the front porch.
Gee , I thought, it doesn't even hurt .
A giant black heel came down from the sky and blotted out the sun.
Six
Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide in thy crib? Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrows? or will he harrow the valleys after thee? Wilt thou trust him because his strength is great? or wilt thou leave thy labour to him? Wilt thou believe him, that he will bring home thy seed, and gather it into thy barn?
—Job, 39: 9-12
It was dark out there.
That's all I remember thinking for a long time, that it was dark out there, that I was at the bottom of an ocean of black water and was fighting my way up to distant daylight. It was formless black and stagnant, no eddies or swirls.
Starless , I thought. Starless and Bible black .
I couldn't feel anything. Why couldn't I feel anything?
Because someone stuck a giant hypo in your back and shot you full of Novocain. Whole body. Numb. Numbnumbnumbnumb.
Oh, yeah. It's frightening to walk in the dark if you can't even feel your way around. What did that remind me of? Oh, sure. "The Pit and the Pendulum." Good old Poe.
Was there some deeper hole out there in that blackness, waiting
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