Threads 195-Liminal 4

In her hands, the compass was aglow, casting light on her face, but Ling Qi didn’t notice at first because there, at the end of an long open hall that descended into the face of the debris mountain, she saw the dream idol floating in the air, casting a faint golden glow in the darkness. Light now glowed in slim crescents from beneath still closed eyelids. Ling Qi felt a sudden urge to begin walking down the hallway.

On her shoulder, Sixiang sucked in a breath. “Oi, get outta here!”

At the muse’s shout, the idol winked out, and Ling Qi felt more than heard the distorted laughter echoing up from the tunnel as if from a thousand voices.

“What was that?” Ling Qi hissed.

“That’s nightmare territory down there. It’s where the dreams have… curdled.” Sixiang seemed unsure of the proper terminology. “I don’t think you want to contend with a whole swarm of those things in their home territory yet.”

Ling Qi pursed her lips and glanced down. The compass was pointing to the right down a vine-lined path made of decaying roofs and awnings.

She took the path downwards instead. It wound down the piled structures which were intermixed with earth and trees and more natural objects. Soon, the path turned inward under an archway of mixed greenery and masonry. The archway looked terribly unstable, but Ling Qi felt no fear of its collapse.

She found more hesitation in the pits that marked the floor, each filled with a darkness her eyes could not see through and whispers of cruel laughter that put her hair on end. She stepped carefully around those, and Sixiang’s glare dispersed the things that tried to crawl into her shadow.

It was hard to track how long she spent walking down the corridor as it bent and twisted inside. There were splits in the path, but at each one, she followed the compass.

Finally, the path opened out into a wide hall. Unlike the rest of the dingy, detritus-ridden labyrinth, it was brightly lit with a roof composed of living branches. Three wide tables were laden with food and drink, and dozens upon dozens of men and women with ruddy skin, black or brown hair, and swept back horns rising from their temples filled their benches and spilled across the floor, laughing and dancing.

The sound of the place, music, laughter, and merriment, struck her like a physical force as she crossed some unseen threshold. In the center of the floor, a pair of athletic men stripped to the waist wrestled, cheered on by those around. On the right, a pair of women alternated in belting out lines of lyrical poetry in clear competition.

The head of the table bore an empty throne of vines and wicker.

No one looked up as she entered. The music wasn’t interrupted, and no guardians stepped forth. As Ling Qi passed by a small knot of revelers on the periphery, they nodded to her as if she belonged.

And for a moment, she felt like she did. After all, this was the grand harvest celebration and the great lord had invited all of the blood to celebrate a successful year in both campaign and harvest in his halls. Where else would she belong? Now was the time to make merry and cast away fear till the morrow!

Ling Qi shuddered and shook herself, casting off the layer of “other” which had almost consumed her thoughts. She became aware of Sixiang shouting in her ear and realized that she had already taken a seat at the nearest table, a half-filled cup of some kind of grain alcohol grasped in her hand.

“That hit me quicker than I expected,” Ling Qi apologized warily. She cast a look at her neighbors, but none seemed to have been alerted by her breaking the spell.

“Don’t worry me like that! You’d already started to grow horns,” Sixiang complained.

Ling Qi’s hand rose to her temple, but she felt nothing. Still, she doubted Sixiang was lying. “I’ll be more careful,” she promised.

She scanned the room, considering her next action. The compass was no further help. It had returned to spinning lazily. She could simply participate in the revel, now that she was on her guard. Who knew what she might be able to learn here? But it did worry her how easily she had fallen under the spell. And the more she looked, the more she was certain that these were not merely echoes, but spirits wearing them like scarves.

The problem was the entrance she had come in by was gone. The only door remaining stood half-open behind the empty throne. It felt familiar, causing her to recall lapping black waters, a skull, and black flowers.

“This isn’t what I’m here for.” Ling Qi looked down at the table full of food and drink. She glanced to her left and right to take in laughing faces.

“I thought you didn’t know what you were here for?” Sixiang asked. “What’s wrong with this place?”

“I don’t think I’ll learn what I’m looking for here,” Ling Qi said. She let out a breath and dispersed. Vanishing from her place on the bench, she reappeared midstep, taking advantage of the movements of the crowd to mask her appearance.

“Oh, did you figure that out?” Sixiang asked, their tiny voice tickling her ear.

“I said it before,” Ling Qi said, weaving between guests. She felt a longing in her heart to stop and observe, to listen to poetry and song, to drink from their cups. To belong here safe and content. She hardened her mind against the creeping intrusion of foreign identities, and when a laughing man grasped at her arm, she spun elegantly to the side, leaving him grasping a stylized phantom in her likeness who led him away in the dance he sought.

“I want to know why,” Ling Qi murmured, her eyes fixed on the door. “This… This is all how and what. That’s important too, but I can’t learn why things are as they are here.”

“Well, I won’t gainsay you on it, even if I wish we could stay.” Sixiang sighed, looking out over the revelry.

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“We’ll find our time for fun,” Ling Qi said.

“Liar,” Sixiang accused. ”You’re bad at that. How do you intend to get in there?”

Ling Qi moved around a pair of laughing women, their arms thrown over each other’s shoulders. Her eyes fell again on the closed door, but now, a man stood in front of it. His expression lacked the merriment of the revelers, and she recognized his scanning gaze and alertness.

It would not normally be a problem to avoid so mundane an obstacle, but she knew somewhere in her gut that trying to pass immaterially through that door would go poorly for her. Instinctively, she understood that she would need to turn the handle and open the portal manually.

“Let me assist. I think I’ve finally found a new twist that works,” Sixiang offered.

On her shoulder, the faerie-sized muse dissolved, and Ling Qi blinked as she felt a rushing feeling like the tide running over her feet and around her ankles. A few meters away where the man stood, she saw him blink and then grow slack for just a moment. Then, the man straightened up and shot her a grin, familiar but made alien by the features that wore it.

Ling Qi covered the remaining distance swiftly, keeping an eye on the other revelers, echoes and spirits that they were.