The Call of Distant Shores by David Niall Wilson, Bob Eggleton Read Free Book Online

to measure her against.   Sammy was as she was, and she, in the end, had failed as well.   This one, also, on Belle.
    Now came the test.   No conduit.   No half-truth or interpretation.   Belle, the glass, the deep green magic, and the words.   She would find the caves of ice and prostrate herself on their cold, sharp edges until she was accepted, taken or broken, but one with what had been lost.   Dark powerful eyes haunted her, tracking each motion and each thought, seeing through flesh and bone and soul.   Waiting.
    She took the tumbler gently into her hands.   Candlelight flickered about her, and the incense, ever-present, grew cloying and thick, a taste that lingered in the back of her throat, drying her out and reaching to the absinthe for succor and warmth.   Belle shivered a final time, so deeply that she shook and nearly spilled the thick green liquid over her hands and the floor.   Her knees rattled on the floor, and she gasped.
    Throwing her head back, she brought the drink to her lips and upended it.   The heat was intense, the burn glorious and excruciating and powerful, all at once, washing down through her   in a burst of fire and dripping behind, bringing secondary sizzle to slowly singe her throat. She did not move, fearing it would be too strong, that she might vomit or pass out, that she might fail herself as so many others who had gone before.   They hadn't failed, because they hadn't been reaching out for anything.   Only Belle had failed, and as the hot liquor burned down her throat, she knew it was her courage that had been lacking, not the ingredients, or the mix, not the strength of will of another, presented as her sacrifice.   Placing the glass on the altar, she glanced at her book – her notes – in scorn.   She had been hiding in the research, hiding between the pages, lacking the courage to see.   To know.
    She closed her eyes, and the words came unbidden, slowly, then with growing force.   She recited in a steady, throaty voice that purred with strength and resolution.
     
    " In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
    A stately pleasure-dome decree:
    Where Alph , the sacred river, ran
    Through caverns measureless to man
    Down to a sunless sea.
    So twice five miles of fertile ground
    With walls and towers were girdled round:
    And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
    Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
    And here were forests ancient as the hills,
    Enfolding sunny spots of greenery..."
     
    Belle clamped her eyes tightly, her hands out to her sides for balance.   The absinthe leaked into her thoughts and drew her deeper, thickening her tongue as she fought for completion.   Images opened in her mind.   Art's painting flashed into view, but with details he had never seen.   The ice rippled with fire.   The ground shook with the marching cadence of a horde of booted feet.   The landscape surged with greenery, and huge, spouting geysers splashed into the air and fell to the earth, all in the rhythm of a huge heartbeat, drawing her inward.
    Her body arched once more, prone against the floor, the altar before her and her knees spreading wider, inviting.   She wore a short, soft linen dress, nothing beneath, but it didn't matter.   The sensations that washed through her had nothing to do with clothing, or the room surrounding her, or the world where she lived and breathed and lusted for ... what?
    "For he on honeydew hath fed,"
    The words seeped up from beneath her, hands fashioned of letters that lifted her and offered her... .
    "And drunk the milk of paradise."
    She saw a young man, long flowing dark hair and a broad nose, dark eyebrows furrowed in concentration.   In his hand he held a quill, dark with ink.   He seemed to see her in that same instant, studying her, every inch and curve, eyes bright.   His hand trembled, and a droplet of ink threatened to fall to whatever surface he penned upon.
    Beside him a bottle sat, aged and crusted with sugar crystals, the cork