The Mysteries of Holly Diem (Unknown Kadath Estates Book 2) (18 page)

Beneath the canopy, the rain was gone and the night
was warm and fragrant. The tables of the vendors were stocked with mysterious
implements and dusty curiosities – whalebone and black pearl, powders of myrrh
and juniper sap, orchid blossoms preserved in alcohol and amber, collections of
tarnished mirrors and antiquated brass keys. One blue-haired vendor boasted of
the potency of the balm she made from cactus fruit obtained in the Waste,
purported to heal and reverse aging, while a vendor in the adjacent tent
demonstrated a piano-like instrument carved from petrified wood to a pair of
robed and malformed customers. The meadow was crowded with customers of varied
and wild appearance and demeanor, as is the norm for the Nameless City.

I could not see the moon, thanks to the canopy, and
that was an inexpressible relief.

I followed Snowball through the Night Market, politely
ignoring the escort of alert looking cats that flanked us at a discreet
distance, marveling at the stalls we passed and the wonders they contained.

An old woman with hair the color of a smoker’s teeth
dusted a pair of jars; one empty, the other appeared to contain a miniature
sun, blinding through tinted glass. Deep in the shadows of a woolen tent,
shirtless albino men labored over miniature forges, crafting delicate and
obscure instruments, with hammer and tong and incredible skill. Another tent
was stocked entirely with portraits, the eyes of each painting carefully
tracking the passersby.

My eyes lingered on a display of mirrors on a salvaged
picnic table; each reflected back a scene that looked nothing like the Night
Market. In the shadows between two tents, a boy in a headdress composed of bone
and fish scale danced suggestively for the amusement of a coin-throwing crowd.
In what looked like a barbershop, laughing men and women slouched in chromed
high chairs while attendants attached them to variety of garishly colored I.V.
bags. From within a tent made entirely of glossy pelts and animal skins, a
woman with ochre skin and long snaking braids called out my assumed name with a
voice that sounded like the call of an unfamiliar bird, offering to sell me
tickets for a Black Train. On the metal grill of a food cart, blue-corn
tortillas crisped in a bath of melted lard.

A wizened man blended colored sand in fluted glass
beakers; a crew of child beggars displayed bruises and emaciated stomachs; a
stable rattled with the tramping hooves of creatures that looked a little like
horses, and quite a bit more like alligators. A jovial man distributed sweets
and milk tea to a group of veiled women, while a stocky woman with a tonsure
tattooed glyphs from the pillars of Iram on the pockmarked back of a sailor.

I wished vaguely for time to browse, but Snowball set
a determined pace, nodding occasionally in response to offered greetings and bows.
I felt certain that there was something of great import, to April and myself,
if only I went looking for it, and was willing to pay the asking price – though
the reason for my certainty was obscure.

I lost track of the tents and vendors by the time we
reached the promenade at the center of the market. The ground was covered with
layers of dense blankets that absorbed the sound of my footsteps. At the heart
of the promenade, on a low dais, a well-appointed pavilion had been furnished.

A very unusual looking lady sat on the generously
cushioned couch among hangings the colors of arctic water and eel grass, greeting
Snowball and his retinue with a warm and amused voice that reminded me very
much of her sister. At the edge of the pavilion, two hunched figures lingered,
their large shapes distinctly nonhuman. On the table in front of the lady, a
lantern was situated, unmistakably composed of a severed and hollowed head. A
massive candle glowed within the empty cranium, swimming in tallow, lighting the
skin from within like parchment.

“Preston Tauschen and Dunwich are under my protection.”
Snowball backed up the warning with a glare. “Remember that.”

The lady’s laughter was like the trilling of an
unfamiliar woodwind.

“Of course, Lord Snowball.”

The lady was beautiful; at least, what remained of
her. Her torso was lithe, but shapely beneath an antiquated dress and an
intimidating amount of lace. She wore her hair long and straight, with a center
part. Three of her limbs were mechanical; composed of brass gears and silver
wire, milled steel joints and liquid mercury balances, finely worked
instrumentation and polished bone. The arm and both legs were just slightly too
long, and swayed and clattered unnaturally. Her fingers belonged to a marble
statue, strung together with wire and animal gut. There were scars around the
rims of her weirdly round eyes, partially concealed with glossy makeup, and she
never blinked. Neither eye matched; brown on the left, robin’s egg blue on the
right.

She caught me looking, and offered an indulgent smile.

“A gift from my middle sister,” she said modestly. “She
bargained with the Outer Dark for them, without thinking of what I might see,
with eyes like that. I was never properly grateful. Or perhaps it isn’t my eyes
that caught your interest?”

I shook my head, my eyes glued to Sumire’s arm,
affixed to a metal sleeve and mounted beneath the unfamiliar lady’s shoulder.
She laughed and gestured with it gracefully.

“The arm is lovely, is it not? I acquired it recently;
I am very fond of it.”

“That’s understandable.” I took what used to be
Sumire’s hand gently, and did my best not to faint. “Nice to meet you, Madeleine
Diem.”

***

Tea parties were a shared affectation in the Diem family. Madeleine and
Holly Diem might have been on uncertain terms, but they were also unmistakably
sisters. Madeleine rang a tiny leaden bell and a troupe of poorly dressed servants
with webbed fingers and inflamed complexions brought a large table to the
center of the pavilion. It was swiftly covered with an eggshell white cloth,
and then a dozen place settings were arranged, along with an equal number of
shallow dishes for the cats. Madeleine ushered me to my chair – the only one on
that side of the table, as my neighbors were all feline – and then took a seat
directly across from me.

The two hulking shapes detached themselves from the
porch and joined us, sitting very close together to Madeleine’s right. Despite
enormous seats of rough-hewn wood, their bulk still threatened to overwhelm the
chairs. Both wore layers of robes, intricately woven as Persian rugs, dense
with patterns that shifted and crawled if I stared too long, with veils of
metal that obscured their faces. Black eyes gleamed with the patient
malevolence common to predatory insects and file clerks.

“You made no mention of inviting your legal
representation,” Snowball hissed, hackles raised. “Should I take offense?”

“Of course not, Lord Snowball.” Madeleine put one hand
to her chest in shock. “Mr. Yog and Mr. Sothoth requested to present Mr.
Tauschen with an offer on an unrelated matter.”

The two freaks seemed discomforted by the mention. The
way their bodies moved beneath those layers of robes reminded me of Sumire’s
stories of the Toads she sometimes encountered, when the moon was close.

“I doubt that very much,” the cat offered sharply.

“My promise stands,” Madeleine said, with a gesture of
annoyance. Around us, shambling servants deposited steaming pots of tea, plates
of biscuits, and a formidable array of jams, spreads, and sweeteners. “No harm
will come to any of you this night, by my hand, or by the appendages of my
lawyers.”

My jaw dropped, but no one paid me any mind, so I put
it back in its normal spot.

“This is not what was agreed to,” Snowball said curtly.
“Any further surprises and I will become extremely displeased.”

The servants poured what looked like blue milk into
the grey dishes in front of the cats. Madeleine Diem inclined her head.

“I understand. May I began?”

“Please,” Snowball said, watching as a much younger
cat took a measured lap from the bowl in front of the aged cat. “Don’t mind
us.”

“I never have. Pardon my rudeness,” Madeleine said,
turning to me with hands clenched before her modest bosom. It was impossible
not to wince, seeing Sumire’s tanned fingers intertwined with crude gears and
animal bone. “Welcome to the Night Market, Preston Tauschen. My family has
maintained a presence here since the very beginning, providing our unique
services. My name is Madeleine, but you can call me Maddy, because we are going
to be good friends.”

She said all of this with conviction and a wide-eyed
smile that was reminiscent, but nowhere near as charming, as her sister’s. Or
maybe I’m biased toward witches who
don’t
cut people’s arms off and wear
them.

Madeleine Diem was like a funhouse mirror reflection
of Holly, a juvenile reflection that appeared a decade and a half younger, but
distorted her shape and demeanor. She rested her saucer in the palm of her
artificial hand while she sipped from the delicate porcelain cup, Sumire’s
little finger extended daintily.

“I’m sorry,” I growled, gripping the table and
startling lawyer, witch, and cat alike with my vehemence. “Normally, I’m very
polite about this sort of thing. You have my neighbor’s arm, though, Madeleine
– and that’s a big problem for me.”

“Preston...” Snowball’s stub of a tail swished back
and forth rapidly. “Go carefully.”

“That’s so sweet!” Madeleine smiled ingratiatingly at
me, running artificial fingers through her bobbed hair. “Finders, keepers, I’m
afraid.”

I clenched the tablecloth between my fingers. The
servant who poured the tea smelled strongly of fish oil and stale cigarettes.

“Are you trying to tell me that you...
found
the
arm?”

“Almost!” Madeleine appeared surprised. “You see,
Preston, I have any number of suitors, and despite my protestations, they are
all very generous. Their gifts have taken a thoughtful turn of late, to objects
of practical use and value.”

“Like arms and legs?”

“I am so glad that we understand each other.”

“Did you attack Sumire?”

“Not at all! I spent the evening with one of my
paramours, had a bit too much to drink, and retired early. When I woke, this,”
she said, gesturing at Sumire’s arm with the mechanical limb, “waited for me.
It is, I think, a perfect fit.”

A chill ran down my spine, and I shivered, though the
aspirin Yael gave me had tamped down the fever some.

“I want the arm back.” The words seemed to come from
somewhere else, but they carried a certain authority. “I want you to fix what
you did to my neighbor.”

Snowball watched without comment. If I had to guess,
then I bet he found the whole scene hilarious. Or mortifying. Who’s to say?
He’s a cat, after all.

“That is impossible, Mr. Tauschen.” The regret in her
voice sounded legit. “Your friend’s arm is regrettably lost. The limb retains
vitality thanks only to my occult energies. Should it be separated from me,
decay would shortly follow.”

I looked at the cat beside me, muzzle stained blue,
the purported Lord of the Cats of Ulthar. Any port in a storm, I suppose.

“That true?”

Snowball squinted, and rubbed his nose with a paw.

“It is very likely,” he concluded. “Madeleine Diem was
rebuilt with technology excavated by the servants of the Drowned Queen, from the
ruins beneath the waves. Manipulations of flesh and necrosis seem well within
the realm of such black science.”

“Please do not speak as if I am not here,” Madeleine
said, taking a dainty bite from a scone, and then dabbing her full violet lips
with a napkin. “It is impolite.”

“Are you sure you aren’t lying, because you want to
keep the arm?”

“I
do
want to keep the arm,” she confirmed,
studying it happily. “It is very nice – much better than the one I had
originally. I am telling you the truth, though, however convenient it might be.
I cannot return the appendage, even if I wished to. Allow me to restate – I did
not take your friend’s arm, nor would I do such a thing.”

“What about your sister’s head, then?”

“Oh, Mr. Tauschen, you know how sisters are,” she
said, patting her grotesque lantern. “Always borrowing each other’s things.”

“Forget I asked.” I folded my arms and tried to look
tough. “What do you want from me?”

“It’s not fair,” Madeleine protested, tossing a balled
up napkin on the table. “You are so much nicer to my sister.”

“How would you know, anyway?”

“Oh, Elijah tells me everything,” Madeleine said, with
a grin full of nasty insinuations. “You’d be surprised what I know about you,
Preston.”

“Maybe it’s your sister that’s so much nicer. Ever think
of that?”

Her cheeks went pale at the thought.

“Your reputation suggested that you were a reasonable
man, Preston.”

I shrugged and waited. That drives everyone crazy.

“Can we start over? Please?” Madeleine watched me
hopefully. “You haven’t even heard my reasons, yet.”