“Are you known by any name besides ‘the Russian’?” said X. “I should have inquired years ago.”
“Thank you asking,” said the guard. “True fact is am not Russian, okay? Am from Oo-kra-EEN.” Seeing X’s blank look, the guard added, “Ukraine. Yes? Okay? I try to explain this to Reeper but, of course, she is always pretending to be lunatic-type. When I tell her, she sing something about canary.”
“And how did your foot come to be twisted?” said X.
“Is nothing, is defect of birth,” said the Russian. “I overcome. I achieve master’s degree at University of Kiev, and also lucrative life of crimes.”
The guard’s eyes went to the door. He listened for footsteps.
“Whom do we await?” said X.
The Russian hesitated.
“Terrible creature,” he said. “I lie little bit about fairyland palace, okay? This place you go is not good. I think you don’t like.”
“Tell me what you know,” said X. “Hold nothing back. The hill can be no worse than the hole where I’ve dwelt these past twenty years.”
“Oh, very much it can,” said the guard. “You have seen just tiny, country-club part of Lowlands in your little life, okay? We are now in kind of Wild West. Is full with most serious, prodigious criminals. Genocidal maniacs and so forth. There are no cells—just bodies everywhere like worms. There is only one lord, but she is nastiest type of person. She punishes souls however she pleases, and no one says, ‘Hey, what are you doing? You must stop!’ She is called ‘the Countess.’ ”
The Russian listened again for noises, afraid of being overheard.
“When I was boy, my babushka tell me I will go to hell if I do this, if I do that,” he said. “She even has painting of hell hanging over expensive stereo system. I look at painting very often as boy because it contains many naked people. This new home you have? Sorry to say, but it is like painting. I will not step foot myself. When Countess comes for you, I run very fast away.”
Before X could reply, they heard footsteps beyond the door. The door groaned open, and a wedge of light widened across the floor.
Two men entered. They were almost absurdly muscled—and naked except for a just barely sufficient bit of animal hide at their waists. They had olive skin, curly hair, beards.
Greeks, thought X. Boxers.
They were indistinguishable. Their hands were wrapped in leather, which was spotty with blood.
The Russian acknowledged the boxers nervously. They ignored him, and stationed themselves like granite columns on either side of the door. Soon, X heard the rustling of fabric, the clicking of shoes. The Countess was coming. The boxers drew themselves up taller. They were enormous, but appeared frightened now.
The Countess swept into the chamber. She wore a burgundy velvet gown with a high white collar and a skirt that looked like an upended tulip. Her energy transformed the room. It was furious and sour, and seemed to take up physical space.
She inspected X carefully.
The Countess had an explosion of frizzy red hair, streaked here and there with gray; a small, sweaty nose; and protruding eyes that gave her a look of perpetual outrage. Her hands were raked with scratches.
She addressed the Russian, all the while scowling at X and picking at an inflamed pimple at the corner of her mouth.
“Who dost thou dangle before the Countess?”
X had never encountered a person who talked about herself as if she were someone else.
“He is good guy,” said the Russian. “I can verify. Will not ruffle you.”
“It shall be his undoing if he does,” said the Countess. She continued scrutinizing X. “The Countess demands obeisance. Anyone who will not kneel is put to fire and sword. Some believe that the Countess is cruel—that her mind is disordered.” She addressed the boxers: “Such things are whispered, are they not? Answer on it!”
The men shook their heads no.
“Liars,” said the woman. “Cowards.” She turned back to X. “These men are called Oedipus and Rex. Do not bother addressing them—they are too dumb to pile stones. The Countess found it necessary to bite one of them here”—she pointed to an oval wound on one boxer’s side—“to tell them apart.”
She jabbed the wound with the same sharp fingernail she’d used on her pimple. The boxer convulsed with pain, his torso twisting like a rope.
The Russian began to edge out of the chamber.
“Thou art too eager to depart,” the Countess told him.
She hoisted the guard by his tracksuit as if he were made of straw, and heaved him at the door. Then she recommenced scratching her pimple, as if nothing had happened. She scanned the length of X’s body. Her eyes felt like insects on his skin.
She noticed that his right hand was closed.
“What dost thou conceal?” she said.
X hesitated, which caused the Countess’s eyes to bulge even farther from their sockets.
“Unclench thy hand,” she demanded, “else the Countess shall paint a pretty picture with thy blood.”
He opened his fingers, knowing everything was about to change.
On his palm lay a crust of bread.
“Wherefore would a dead man EAT?” said the Countess.
Though X had told his story many times, it still shamed him. He had to push the words out.
“I was born in the Lowlands. I am twenty years old. My name is X.”
The Countess nodded, as if this was all ordinary, though she was obviously vibrating with rage. She leaned over the Russian, who was still in a heap on the floor.
“Thou shalt be our guest for eternity, too,” she said. “The Countess shall not have her OWN men scurrying around the Lowlands in search of food. Thou mayest leave the hill only when this man is a hair’s breadth from starvation. Tarry longer than necessary, and the Countess shall hunt thee down and—instead of bread—feed him thy liver.”
The black flies of her eyes settled on X again.
“X, is it?” she said.
“Yes.”
She reared back, and smashed his face with her forehead.
The last thing he heard before losing consciousness was, “Thou ART NOT special, and thou hast NO NAME.”
eight
X woke on a hill of prickly rock. He remembered the Countess’s head rushing at him, and a wet, sickening crack. He touched his forehead. It was sticky with blood.
Someone must have carried him here—the Russian or maybe one of the boxers. He sat up woozily.
Bodies lay strewn all around. They coughed and gasped, slithered around the slope, stared without blinking. It was hard to move without touching one of them. Even when X sat still, someone’s rubbery hand or lank, dirty hair would suddenly graze him and give him a chill. He was grateful he’d been unconscious as long as he had. Looking around his new home, he suspected that he’d never sleep again.
How could Regent have sent him here? Was he still enraged at X for breaking the Lowlands’ laws? Was his promise to help him just a lie tossed out in the interest of getting Ripper back?
X stood for a better view. At the top of the hill, there was a plateau about 20 feet square, on which—unbelievably—the Countess lay on a sumptuous canopied bed, idly scratching her white stockinged feet. It was the most garish display X had ever seen. He assumed it was intended to make the souls on the hill feel even more wretched. At the end of the bed, there was a wooden box, the sides of which were cut with holes. Every so often a mewling sound escaped it. The Countess, it appeared, had a cat.