The next day was unseasonably warm and Jane went out on the Campanile with only a
windbreaker. The Campanile had never rung that Jane could recall. Perhaps there was no
money for it. But on a good day it was a fine place to hang out with a few friends, catch
some sun, and maybe get stoned.
An erratic breeze whipped Jane's hair back. She stuck her hands in her hip pockets and
leaned into it. From the top of Tintagel she could see the three other University buildings
and beyond them the clustered ranks of buildings great and small that made up the Great
Gray City. They were an army of stone, marching to a battle somewhere beyond the
horizon. Gray and hazy they looked against a sky that was as white as a blank sheet of
paper.
Sirin wasn't here yet, but Jane rolled herself a smoke anyway. It took three matches to
light. She drew in, closed her eyes, exhaled slowly. Leaning back against one of the
Campanile's support beams, she stared up at the black bronze bells, streaked white with
pigeon droppings.
A kind of bleak exhilaration filled her then. Somehow she was going to survive, raise the
money to complete her education, and make a place for herself in the world. The blind,
clifflike surfaces of the City convinced her of it. Surely there must be niches enough in so
vast and anonymous a habitat for one as small and insignificant as she to get by.
"Bitch of a view, ain't it?"
She turned. The speaker crouched on the lip of the stone railing. He was monkey-browed,
chinless, squint-eyed, loose-lipped, pugnosed, batwinged, potbellied, goat-horned,
hunchbacked, sphinx-haunched, and altogether charming. A thuggish light gleamed in his
slitted eyes. A gargoyle.
"Yes," she said. "Yes, it is."
"You going to hold onto that thing all day?"
Jane looked down at her hand, then up at the gargoyle. She dug through her knapsack
looking for something the right weight. Then she put the joint down on the rail and
anchored it with a compact. "Want a drag?"
"Don't mind if I do." The gargoyle shuffled closer and extended a long, apish arm. His
blunt fingers closed about the cigarette. He took a slow, careful drag, then offered it back
at arm's length. Jane shook her head. She knew something about gargoyles' hunting
strategies.
"What's your name?" the gargoyle asked."Jane."
He made a brusque, clumsy, almost comical bow. "Sordido di Orgulous, at your service.
Come here to sort things out, did you?"
"No, there's somebody I'm hoping to meet." Jane was looking for Sirin and Nant had told
her that she liked to hang out here about this time of day.
"Me too."
Jane stared out into the City, enjoying its complexity, its size, its silence. Finally, more to
be polite than because she actually cared, she said, "Another gargoyle?"
Sordido guffawed. "Haw! We rock people are too territorial for that. I got the south face,
top fifteen floors. North face, top, belongs to Lordo di Branstock. Down below you got
Sozzo di Tintagel. A local boy. One of those sleazebags sets foot on my turf, and I'll
teach him a little lesson in how to fall.
"No, I got a regular little clientele comes out to talk things over with me. I'm a good
listener. Comes of having such a slow metabolism. I don't get bored easily."
"What sorts of things do they talk about?"
"You'd be surprised. Shit they wouldn't tell their best friends. Most of 'em are just having
a little flirt with danger. Others have got a serious self-destructive streak. They talk. I
listen. They ask my advice. I give it. Every so often I manage to sweet-talk one over the
edge. Then I eat. Nine times out of ten, that's what they were really after from the
beginning. I got good hopes for the one who likes to come around here about this time."
A dark suspicion seized Jane. "You wouldn't know her name, would you?"
"Naw."
"Tall, good legs, long hair?"
"No offense, missy, but I have a hard time telling you guys apart."
"I see." Jane lapsed into silence.
For a time, they shared the view without speaking.
"So how about that Teind?" Sordido said suddenly. "You looking forward to it?"
Jane looked at him. "If that's the word for it. You figure it's bound to get somebody you
know, maybe even a lot of them. So I'm not exactly anxious for it to happen. But then
again, once it's over, it'll be over. You can get on with things. So maybe it'd be best if ithappened and were done with." She paused. "What do you care about the Teind, anyway?
I thought you guys were immune."
"It's the only time we get to eat our fill."
"Oh." She looked away.
"Oh," Sordido mimicked. "Oh dear. How terribly vulgar." Angrily, he reared up on his
haunches and ponderously unfolded his wings. They were enormous. "Look at me. How
much energy do you think it takes to get something this heavy up into the air?"
"Well—"
"A lot, that's how much. I'll tell you something else you don't know about the rock
people. We only mate on the wing. Got that? So once every ten years you fill your streets
with carrion and we get to climb down and eat our fill. It ain't pretty, I'll grant you that,
but whose fault is that? We eat all we can. Then we start to climb again, back up the sides
of whatever building is closest.
"It's a bitch of a climb. It takes hours. We've been at our business all day, so probably it's
sunset. Them blood-gorged skies are as shiny bright as Hell Gate itself then. Clouds as
purple as a bruise. We climb. Everything grows dark and the stars come out. By the time
we get to the top, it's night.
"You've maybe noticed that the rock people ain't got many females. So when our ladies
come into heat, there's a lot of competition for their favors. The moon comes up. We
wait. Finally one begins to sing." He shivered. "Nekhbet! You don't know how beautiful
their voices are. So sweet you want to fling yourself right off the building."
The door to Tintagel quietly opened and shut. Sirin walked out into the Campanile. When
she saw Jane, she looked startled. But after an instant's hesitation, she sat down beside
her on the railing. Together they listened to the gargoyle.
"... by one, the gents raise their voices in answer. Deep and low. We don't sound so
lovely, maybe, but it's profound. Like thunder after larksong.
"Dunno how long the singing lasts. You kind of lose track. But at last she stretches out
and looks around. Kind of teasing-like. She spreads her wings. She leaps. She flies. She
soars high up into the sky, and she's still singing.
"That's when we totally lose control. We scrabble over the edge, and instinct takes over.
Maybe twenty-thirty-forty of us will form up into a flock and fly after her. We're all
feeling our oats, laughing and joking. She's only going to mate with one of us. So it gets
rough up there. That's how I got this kink in my leg. That's how I lost two of these." He
spread his claws, retracted them again."Now, it's the ladies who perpetuate the race. They got to raise the cubs, keep 'em fed,
and kick 'em off the ledge when they get big enough to start killing each other. So natch,
they're a lot stronger than the gents. Only the best of us can keep up. The flock dwindles.
And of course there are ways of convincing the competition that it's maybe time to go
home.
"Finally, there's just you and her. She's still ahead of you, but she ain't trying to get away.
Fact is, maybe she slows down a bit. Maybe she glances back, kind of flirty, to see what
you're like. She tilts a wing, and the moonlight is pale on her flank. Ahhhh, but she's long
and as tawny-lean as a lioness. Her talons are like black glass daggers. Her breasts are
two white skulls, and there's hunger in her eyes.
"She spirals upward, and you follow. The City falls away. The air is cold and clear. Your
every muscle aches like fire, but you're getting closer. Her wings obliterate the sky. She
reaches out her slender arms to you, and she's as beautiful and tender as Death herself.
The smell of her musk is maddening. She wants you—she can't hide it—as bad as you
want her."
Sirin was breathing shallowly. "It sounds lovely," she whispered.
"So the ladies tell us." Sordido heaved a long, deep sigh. "Then again, that's what they
would say, innit? It's not as if the gent ever got to voice an opinion on the subject
afterwards."
"I beg your pardon?" Jane said.
"Well, we don't survive it, do we? The lady's had a long night, and pretty soon she's
incubating a brood of maybe a dozen cubs, she's going to need her energy. She's got to
eat something."
"That's grotesque!" Jane said.
Sirin said nothing.
"Yeah, well, from your point of view, maybe so. But you can't blame them for it—the
ladies. That's just our biology. They got no say over it." For a moment Sordido sank in on
himself in gloom. Then, with visible effort, he straightened. A slow shrug. "Well. Look,
I'm sorry if I'm depressing you. It's just that the subject is kind of—you know."
"I understand."
"No hard feelings?" He held out his hand.
"No hard—""Jane!" Sirin grabbed Jane and yanked her back as she reached out to take the gargoyle's
hand. The stone fingers closed about empty air.
Sordido chuckled. "Damn."