The Shattered Goddess by Darrell Schweitzer Page A

forward in his chair, surveying the scene with rapt fascination. What was happening to his face? Ginna wondered why no one else seemed to see it. The pale blue eyes were gone, replaced by black pits which spread slowly across the cheeks, eating away the flesh. Eventually there was only an oval darkness where the face had been. Then there was another face, outlined in a fiery red in thatdarkness, a hideous old woman who, or so it seemed to his dizzy imagining, was somehow nourished by the pain and fear, drinking it all in.
    Even that face grew soft like melting wax and disappeared. The blackness extended outward grotesquely, until it was nothing human at all. It was the head of a wolf, no, a bottomless abyss, a rip in the fabric of the world in the shape of a wolf, growingout of the front of The Guardian’s head.
    All other eyes were on the two floggers and their victim, who now lay still.
    Didn’t anyone else see?
    The wolf was flowing up out of the boy’s corpulent body. Like a stream of black ink it poured down over his lap and onto the steps which led down from the throne. Then, finding its feet, the wolf scampered to where Saemil lay.
    Againthere was a rift in the crowd and Ginna could see through. The wolf was lapping up the old woman’s blood. The executioners didn’t seem to notice and went on with their work.
    On the throne Kaemen sat, his face gone, his head hollow.
    Ginna’s knees buckled. He fell against the table. Grabbing wildly for support, he struck a tray and sent it clattering to the floor. For an instant he waskneeling, his head and one hand against the edge of the table. Then he pitched forward and rolled under it, onto his back, vaguely aware of a vast forest of legs extending in three directions and a wall blocking the fourth.
    * * * *
    For a long time after that there was nothing but warm haze. Slowly it cleared, until he could see every detail of the great hall. It was empty now, anddark. The crowd had departed. The corpse of the nurse lay sprawled on the stone tiles, atop, curiously enough, a mosaic of the dark aspect of The Goddess like the one on the opposite wall.
    He was not quite alone. Kaemen still sat on his throne, still leaning forward. His face was still gone, his head still hollow. But the darkness was stirring inside, slowly rising. It began to pour outof the opening, over his chin, like an underground river suddenly emerging out of a cavern, spilling down the steps and onto the floor. There seemed no end to it. It gathered around the carcass and splashed over it in oily waves, spreading to all comers of the room. Toward Ginna. He wanted to rise and flee, but his body would not respond. In helpless terror he watched the stuff ooze toward him. Hecounted the squares of the tile as they were covered one by one. The floor was almost entirely hidden, and still the stuff came forth from the Guardian in great gouts.
    It was not a substance at all, but a lack of anything. A total void, a dark, limitless emptiness erasing the world.
    It touched him on one shoulder, then all along one side. He was numb and cold, so cold. The waves washedover him, covering him until only his face was above the surface.
    All sensation faded. He lay there, staring up at the underside of the table for a long time. He had no way of telling how long. It seemed as if his body were gone, and only his face remained. He concentrated. Yes, he could feel the air on his cheeks, and something else. A tingling. A sense of floating.
    His face was becomingdetached from his head. He could feel it peeling off, flapping as the fluid darkness found its way underneath. The cold was inside his brain now, stabbing, killing. His face drifted free. His awareness seemed to go with it He saw the underside of the table whirling around, or so it seemed. In fact it was he—his face only—which was turning, spinning like a leaf in a swollen stream. The wavescaressed his cheeks from beneath. His vision shifted as he rose and fell with the