The Vorrh

not Christmas. As he slid back into a painless sleep, Tsungali continued to sing an ancient chant to keep the ghost bound tight in the body.
    ‘Hold him,’ ordered Nebsuel.
    Ishmael was propped up on the bed, Tsungali’s rock-like good arm bound around him.
    ‘The last layers of leaves and bandages might hurt when I remove them.’
    In the fetid darkness, Ishmael braced himself. The drugs had kept the pain at bay, but he knew that it was only sheltering, that it would emerge with vengeance when given half a moment. He was weary and mute; his body strained for experience, and his brain was exhausted through a lack of dreams. Now he could feel it all focusing in his itching face, sense it being rubbed awake under Nebsuel’s unwrapping.
    Murky, stained light seeped in and his hackles rose as the dressing tugged at the split nerves and sewn flesh. The final mass came away in one piece, letting the raw light play on his open wound. With the stained mass in his hands, Nebsuel silently studied his handiwork. He touched the new eyelids, and Ishmael yelped. It wasn’t pain, but a curdling flinch of nausea that made him jump.
    ‘Hold still now,’ said Nebsuel, nodding to Tsungali, who gripped the swaying patient more firmly.
    After ten minutes of probing and squinting at his face, the medicine man smiled and said, ‘It is good, young master. Welcome to the mundane world of normal men.’
    Ishmael wanted a mirror, but was denied. ‘Not yet,’ ordered the shaman. ‘You must wait for the swelling to go down. Your first impression is very important. It will stay in your mind forever; you must wait so that you will retain a good image, not a half-healed one.’
    Ishmael saw the sense in this, and decided to allow his good eye a few more days to be alone.
    ‘I am leaving to fetch provisions, news and wine,’ announced Nebsuel. ‘My senses are tired and I need time away from the smell of your raw flesh. Look for me in a day or two, and do not look on or touch that face; let the air and sun mend it.’
    Ishmael thought about threatening him over his return, but it seemed wrong, so he simply waved and said ‘Be careful!’ through the lower, working part of his face.
    He settled back in the bed and allowed himself to imagine a new life, one without strangeness and hiding, a life full of lessons and couplings, of carnivals and friends. Unexpectedly, the Owl rose up in his memory on silent and elegant wings, wings as white and pure as her silk bed linen; as powerful and soft as her hungry body and her lessons of kiss. He would see her again. She would not know him, but he would know her. He refused the pain-killing potion that Tsungali had been instructed to feed him. He had been dull for enough time. He wanted to focus on who and what he knew, and who he was ready to become.
    Tsungali was cooking in a small alcove behind a hanging carpet. He was still getting used to his new hand and forearm and he muttered occasionally at its errors over the stove. The rich smell of simmering grain infused with thyme was settling across the room. Ishmael had found a book containing images of gardens, hand-coloured woodcuts printed on thick, crafted paper that itself still showed plant fibres crushed into its surface. He believed them to be fabled gardens from all over the world. He was looking at one from Tunisia, turning the book sideways to gaze at the interior depth, when he heard the door open.
    ‘Nebsuel!’ he called out. ‘I have taken one of your books to look at.’
    The wrong kind of silence greeted his statement, the kind that made the house suddenly brittle. Tsungali sensed it too, and quickly drew back the carpet screen.
    ‘What is it?’ said Ishmael. ‘Is there somebody here?’
    Tsungali reached forward towards his weapons, then stopped, yanked upright, standing to attention. Ishmael nearly laughed but could not understand the expression on the grimacing face. They looked into each other’s eyes, both seeking some kind of solution, and then Ishmael saw it move: midway down the old man’s body a small, silver fish twitched and shivered. It was growing in length, and Ishmael could not take his eyes from it. Tsungali, seeing his master’s stare, looked down at the point where the bright blade protruded from his chest. It turned and lengthened again, and he gave out a terrible cough as his heart was sliced through. He fell to his knees, and landed face down. The fish vanished.
    Behind the fallen hunter, in the