Ghosteria Volume 2: The Novel: Zircons May Be Mistaken by Tanith Lee (electronic book reader .TXT) 📕

the stinging and tingling began, Ibelieved it was the end of me. I would not cry out, but writhe there, andshadows closed over me, as, in that other death, there had been no time for meto feel.

When peace poured through, waterthrough a dirty drain, I opened up my eyes, and saw, over by a tree bendingwith its own foliage, a young woman sat. Clearly she was mindless, one of thefoe, even so not raging or lumbering and intent on harm. Perhaps she took mefor one of her own clan, the monsters, for I had drawn on the body of one such.

Then up is she, and runs fleet asa deer. But I am better it seems. And so I get to my feet, and pain it assailsme, but for Christ’s sake not as it was. I judge then from the few wounds takenof enemies in my former human life, that I have healed, heal still, but mendedI am, or will soon be.

Why this is, God He may know.

I think, frankly, it’s just theinflux of ghost-life, revving up the dormant brain and immune system, kickinghealth back into touch, where for the unoccupied Zombie, empty of life-force,operating on overdrive, such abilities are gone.

As I go slowly then back towardsthe house, I pass again the girl like a running deer. She is small and slender,with a lost sad face. Nothing in her bright eyes, except – what is it there?And of which of them does she remind me? I know. This maid is like Coral. Well,then, perhaps...

WhenI am in, and find her in the corridor, I see her plain, as before. It seems Ishall be like Eliseth, or what Eliseth has become – a man? On God’s earth – butstill she can see ghosts, as I now do.

I wish I might take Coral’s handto lead her down, but cannot, she being yet as she is. But she smiles at me hercautious little smile.

“Does it hurt to go into them?”she asks of me.

“No,” I say. “It’s strange – andsometimes there are past injuries–” I try for words to encourage and notaffright her, “But they heal, and well and swiftly. You need only be brave amoment.” How I hope for her this will be so.

But she says, “I am a coward.Afraid of everything, always.”

“The coward,” I answer, “is thebravest of any, if he will act despite his fear. While the hero has no workthat way at all.”

At a window, we pause. “Look, doyou see?”

For there below, on the lawn ofunkempt grass, the deerlike girl stands, as if – waiting. As if that body,soulless and mindless, yet sees that life is due to come back. If it is.

Coral looks out. “She is like me,”says Coral. And then, “When I am her I shall be Cora. Will you be kind to mestill?”

“Ever and always, dear Cora.”

And she drifts out through thewindow, dropping soft as thistledown, as mist and light, over and into and awaywithin the waiting vessel there beneath. So Eve, entering the clay about therib of Man. So the soul entering the chosen child. So the spirit through theNeedle’s Eye.

 

PART FIVE

 

Edward, El, Daphne, Cora and Guy

Theyhave found biscuits, which are hard and stale, and canned fish that seems allright, and tea and coffee which are still viable, once the water has beenheated over the big fire they have laid, and lit with matches. For a wonder,the chimney doesn’t catch alight, perhaps mostly because they wouldn’t care ifit did. There are bottles of red wine, which has lasted, and even a magnum ofChampagne, which bubbles out green, and buzzes in the mouth, but seems not bad,if not as good, probably, as when it was laid down in 2010. The cellars are inan awful state but they’ve rummaged through, laughing and cursing. When loosebits of ceiling and endless cobwebs fell on them, or outraged mice tore overtheir feet, they shouted with joy – they can feel, they can smell andtaste, their skins are scratchable by debris, and their eyes water at the dust.

The party goes on through the dayinto the dark, and across midnight. Their acquired bodies stand up to theonslaught quite well. Only Daphne is sick – the Champagne – and recoversquickly via the dose of brandy El furnishes from an old black bottle. (El alsoheld Daphne’s head while she threw up. El didn’t seem to mind. After, Elstroked Daphne’s yellow hair and said he (he now, El) was going to call Daphne notDaphne, but Daffodil, for this succulent hair.) “I’ll paint you, Baby,”said El. “You’re a beauty. A grand example of the fair sex.” And El thought, Youfilthy wretch, you body. Down boy. Don’t freak her out. But Daphne theDaffodil blushes through her body’s weather-caught tan, and doesn’t seem undulyto mind. Gui and Edward play cards, and teach Cora to play Patience, and Poker,and Gui says he thinks his body must have played cards before, for how elsedoes Gui know these games?

They sleep in batches from about3 a.m. onward. Gui and Cora go to look at the sinking stars near dawn. Edwardlies on his back on the long table, with a cushion under his head, snoring alittle, and hearing himself snore, and loving the noise of a proper throat.

Next day, with childish glee,they all (though decorously in private) perform their natural functions,marvelling nearly religiously over the results, (even Daphne had beenunsuitably fascinated a moment by her sick). They wash in barely heated water,lave on deodorants and hair-gels, and nearly choke themselves with slurps oftoothpaste and harsh new brushes. From ransacked closets, they dress in a comicparade selection of clothes ranging, roughly, between the slightly threadbare1950’s and the outrageously over-retro styles of 2019.

Oh the pleasures of the physical.How had they ever grown bored with these toys? Never, never again. Not so longas they live, which they each intend to do now – if not forever – then for asnear as makes no difference.

But it’s possible, isn’t it, oneway or another, these newly acquired living vehicles the heroes have annexedmay die – of natural causes – war, accident,