Watson, Ian - Novel 08 by The Gardens of Delight (v1.1) Read Free Book Online Page A

nature. We’ve got to get under the skin of this difference.”
                 “First
step, show some skin.” Denise laughed. The berry juice had made her merry too;
but she was proud of herself as well,
with her outspaced golden hair. The great emptiness of the void had presented
her with a gift of space itself: space to strip off in securely, amiably,
anywhere. Her separation from the Earth and all its personscreens was measured
now by the meter rule of her golden fleece, which she had never owned in a
world where ass-long hair might tangle you up in others’ clothes and fingers
and eyes.
                 Muthoni
snapped her briefs apart. She stretched her arms luxuriously. Now that she was
naked the others seemed preposterously confined. Loquela, who had been studying
how a jumpsuit opened with all the intentness of a cat upon a mousehole, now
pounced. Her fingernails slid down a seal, parting Sean’s floppy husk,
discovering his red-haired chest. She stroked it curiously. She remained at
least as intoxicated by Muthoni’s skin, though. Reaching out her left hand to
touch it, she purred again, “Nigredo.”
                 “No,
I shall remain dressed,” said Austin . “But suit yourselves.” He shrugged
hopelessly. “Or unsuit yourselves.”
                 Somehow
Sean doubted whether character armor would remain intact for very long. Though
if it did, it could only get more rigid—so that the eventual break might also
snap the mind within.
                 “Party time,” cooed Loquela.
     

 
FIVE
                 Loquela clapped her hands and gestured
around the well- hung bushes, spotting her finger here
and there. Dimple, Dapple and Dawdle trotted off to fetch fruit for the feast.
                 Tanya
sat down heavily, crossing her legs, anchoring herself to the ground. She was
sweating in her jumpsuit and soon began wriggling about as though hairy worms
were crawling all over her body inside it. Loquela reached to draw Paavo down
and he crouched quickly like a skier about to speed off down a crowded slope,
weaving his way between obstacles— mainly of other people—then hunkered down in
a defecatory stoop, resting on his heels. He scratched his head repeatedly.
                 Austin
shrugged and sat down too, shoulders stiff, arms folded. Sean and the others
sprawled, fitting themselves to the slight lumps and shallows in the spring
mattress of the turf.
                 The
feast, or orgy, began decorously enough with the tasting of fruits—then of more
fruits. In a moment of initial sobriety Muthoni remarked that the colonists had to be strict vegetarians, of course,
if everything that Jeremy had said about evolving fishes and animals were true.
One could hardly fry a trout for breakfast or roast a haunch of venison for
supper! Indeed, the Gardens seemed quite innocent of fire.
                 But a diet of fruit alone? The dietician in her was puzzled.
Jeremy simply grinned, licked one of a bunch of dusty-velvety black grapes to a
gloss with the tip of his tongue and offered it to her.
                 And
as they tasted fruit after fruit, they realized how unique—and satisfying
because unique—each new one tasted, even though they had just tasted the meat
of its twin a few moments earlier.
                 Was
there some neural anti-habituator enzyme in them—Muthoni wondered aloud—in
addition to a balance of vitamins and proteins?
                 Reviewing
his own reactions, Sean realized that there was also a strong psychological
component to each variety of fruit. Cherries were in some way thought-provoking
(and indeed Muthoni was currently chewing a cherry)—whereas a pomegranate left
him with a taste of reverence, or awe . . . This was a mind-feast, he decided,
as much as a belly-filler and nerve-tuner.
                 It
was Denise (now also chewing a cherry)