Garbo’s Faces

a Novel — Part 19: Attra

When we had finished tea, I helped Madhuri clear the table and wash the cups and saucers. Harriet, whose sleep had been cut short by Attra and gang, was still a little tired, she said, and went to her room to rest. In fact, I was still a little tired too, so I followed suit once everything had been cleared away, and the kitchen was once again as clean and shiny as Madhuri insisted it be.

Yes, I had hoped to nap a little but once I had lain down and closed my eyes, the heavy slithering across my legs and up my side to finally end on my chest, told me I would not see sleep just yet. I opened my eyes to find Attra’s face not five inches from mine, still and watching.

“Hello, Attra,” I said.

“Yourself,” he answered.

“You look well.”

“I am well. You too?”

“I’m fine, yes,” I said.

He did not answer, just looked at me.

“It’s been a long time,” I said.

“Too long.”

He shifted his weight on my chest. It was a familiar, comfortable feeling, almost like an embrace.

“Too long,” I agreed.

“You’ve stayed away,” he said.

“Not stayed away,” I said. “It’s not like I’ve avoided. I just remained, in England.”

“I know,” he said. “But that adds up to the same thing.”

I clasped my hands behind my neck to support my head, the better to see him. “I’ve missed you,” I said.

“You’re a man now,” he said.

“I guess I am.”

“I am older still,” he said.

“You?” I said. “You don’t look old.”

“We don’t look old,” he said. “We just leave when the time comes.”

I had never thought about that before. Of snakes as old, of snakey signs of aging. I looked at his poised head, scales still fresh and shiny, his black tongue, his white, shiny fangs. Well, somewhere between white and yellow. Perhaps that was a sign. I remembered them as very white.

“Are fangs a sign?” I asked.

“Perhaps,” he said. “But they are marked more by food than time.”

I looked at his long, strong neck. Shifting a little, I took in the rest of his long body, curling to a close at my feet, all clean, fresh, unaged. “Then you don’t look old,” I said.

“We slow down, internally,” he said. “And eventually we stop.”

“What are you saying?” I asked. Vaguely alarmed.

“Oh, you wish,” he said. “No, not me. Not for many years to come, but I can feel the slowing, that’s what I’m saying.”

I was relieved to hear that, and it must have shown.

“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he said.

“You can’t leave,” I answered.

“I won’t.”

He shifted again, a kind pressure, spreading evenly from chest to stomach.

“You made quite an impression on her ladyship,” I said.

“The famous one,” he said.

“She’s my mother, you know.”

“I know.”

“I’m beginning to think she’s more than that,” I said.

He was waiting for more.

“Esh has asked to see her,” I said.

Unless you know what to look for you can never tell when you have truly startled a cobra. But I knew, and I noticed. Attra’s tongue quivered for a breath and withdrew and stayed vanished until he spoke again.

“I did not know that. Madhuri didn’t tell me.”

“Perhaps I was not supposed to tell.”

“Esh sees nobody nowadays.”

“He has invited her. Madhuri is to bring her, and I am to come as well.”

“And Attra?” he asked.

“I don’t know.”

“I would like to come,” he said. “I would like to see Esh again.

“So you have met him?” I asked.

“Oh, a long time ago. When you were a little boy in school.”

“A long time ago,” I agreed. Then I added, “I will ask Madhuri that you come as well.”

“I would like to come,” he said again, and fell silent, thoughtful, almost a little heavier on my chest.

“You are tired,” he said then. “You have traveled far.”

“I’ll survive,” I said.

“No. I will let you rest,” he said. “I will wake you later.”

I smiled at that, remembering my childhood’s alarm clock, more reliable than any you could buy and wind up. Every morning, the familiar slither up the side, and tickle in my ear where tongue and breath conspired to bring me back from even the deepest sleep.

“Thank you,” I said.

I was falling asleep even as he slipped back down my bed and onto the floor.

Of course Attra was coming, Madhuri said. That had already been decided — demanded, in fact, either by Esh himself or by his people, Madhuri wasn’t sure which. But Attra knew the way and was to lead us, for Madhuri had never been, she said.

“But you told me you had met him,” I reminded her.

“He came to see me,” she said. “And that was very, very long ago. Jiddu was not born then.”

“How old is he?” I asked.

“As old as a snake can get,” she answered.

“And how old is that?” I asked, not really expecting an answer.

Madhuri stopped what she was doing and turned to face me to see if I in fact was expecting an answer to that — judging by her face — impertinent question.

“Old,” was all she replied, then returned to preparing our provisions. It would take three, perhaps four days to reach Esh’s lair, a deep cave in the far hills.

© Wolfstuff