The Last Page by Anthony Huso Read Free Book Online Page A

forked tongues. Their bloodred eyes glared ferociously at children who stepped too close. Hairless purple dogs pulled two amputees in a pair of rolling midget thrones. Flowered hats, pipe smoke, stale booze and shit of all kinds stunk together on the platform. Bodies pressed into queues like hülilyddite waiting to explode. There were scuffles. Eventually men in uniform started getting the animals sorted.
    Steam and sound shrieked from whistles and pistons as Caliph handed a thin man his ticket and climbed aboard. Inside, the air was so close it felt infected. One couple kissed obliviously despite their proximity to a woman shaped like piled trash and a reading man who snorted every thirty seconds.
    The Vaubacour Line ran west to Woonsocket and from there to Miryhr or south a thousand miles into the Theocracy of the Stargazers.
    Sena’s map would be of no use until he reached the Highlands of Tue. It showed only a small section of country and did even that poorly.
    Caliph found room as the engines screamed. He sank into a red leather seat whose springs and stuffing erupted like fungi.
Maybe I want to get lost,
he thought.
Maybe I want to get lost and I’m never coming back.

CHAPTER 5

    Tynan doesn’t come to her graduation. He has never seen her time at Desdae as important.
    Commencement goes off, bitter, solitary and anticlimactic, concluding with rain.
    It doesn’t matter,
she tells herself.
I did this for me.
But she feels desolate.
Fuck Tynan Brakest. Fuck Caliph Howl too for not showing up.
    Then
they
arrive.
    Women in rain-dark storm cloaks looking bizarre, so pragmatically dressed amid the throng of suit coats and corsets. As parasols pop open and people bustle into Desdae Hall, the three women move against the current, directly toward her.
    Sena’s heart stammers as though she is losing her balance on a ledge. She considers running but then, paradoxically heroic and at the same time alarming, Darsey Eaton swoops in.
    The undisputed master of his domain, Chancellor Eaton faces the three women uncowed and unaware of his peril. Sena finds a touch of comedy in watching him bring them up short. He towers, pear-shaped, leaning forward, hands behind his back, the welcoming smile on his face in perfect counterpoint to the deep-set eyes that wield disdain like a pair of clubs. Sena sees it in third person: the whole uncomfortable little crowd grazing the lip of satire, smiling thinly over introductions and regarding one another with cordial skepticism.
    Shucking fear, Sena makes her way to Darsey’s side and joins the conversation. She can tell that the chancellor doesn’t believe any of it: neither that Megan is her grandmother nor that the other two are her cousins. He offers to escort all of them to Desdae Hall where refreshments are already being served.
    Megan returns his invitation with procuress-arrogance. “Thank you but we’ll be along. No need to wait.”
    Sena watches the cords in Darsey’s neck stretch; he smiles and glances sideways into her face. It happens so quickly that Sena barely has time to understand he is checking with her, making certain everything is fine. Itshocks her to realize that, in a cool and businesslike way, he is genuinely concerned.
    When Sena nods faintly he immediately looks elsewhere, scanning the lawn, overseeing the mass of people. Then the chancellor bows, rainwater dribbling from his hat, turns squarely and abandons her, striding purposefully toward the bright open doors of the cultural hall.
    “So good to see you, Sienae,” Megan chirps after he is gone. Sena listens for irony but detects none. She still wonders if she is in trouble. The Shrdnae Mother never ventures outside of Miryhr and her presence at Desdae is bizarre. The ancillas seem tense. They stare at Sena, all business. Maybe they know about Caliph . . . or Tynan. But Darsey is gone. There is no one on the lawn anymore and they would have taken her by now, in the Shrdnae grip, hauling her off to a fiery