'neath the Clouds of Venus

((I wrote a little something over christmas. At the moment it's just one part, but if you like it I could certainly continue.))

CHAPTER I

'ADVENT'

I can hear... Ohh, something... Something... ah, who cares...

Mmm... I'm so comfortable, and warm and safe and it's so nice here in the dark.

I can hear, maybe a voice, but I'm feeling too good to move, even to open my eyes.

Everything's just perfect. Well, almost perfect, maybe the bed is just a touch too hard.

There's that voice again, screaming. I wonder what that's all about.

And this bed really is too hard, and now that I think about it, that draught is quite irritating.

Wait... Screaming?

With a herculean effort I force my eyes open... Bleary, I can hardly see, oh, and this bed feels like it's made of... Ah, it actually is made of stone, and its not a bed...

There's that screaming again and my mind is rapidly returning to lucidity. Screaming and... Roaring?

My eyesight is almost back to normal and I look swiftly around the room, blinking away the blur.

"Argh!" I scream, now!

I leap frantically away from the mummified body I'd been sharing a plinth with, skittering and stumbling wildly over the hard stone floor to sprawl a great distance from my erstwhile bed. The horrid corpse remains still, leering evilly, a wicked silver sword gripped in its twiggish, shrivelled fingers.

The screaming, the other screaming is getting louder and closer, and the roaring too and I am frozen in conflicted confusion and panic. Pale, milky-white light spills into this big stone room from only one place, a grand, trapezoidal doorway a few dozen feet from me. It yawns wide, filling the room with pale, disquieting light. I take my first frightened stride in that direction when I see her.

She comes barrelling into the chamber as though galvanised and before I can even halt my step the roaring reptilian monster follows behind!

Like a dinosaur made of thorns and wicked-bladed knives and shimmering with every colour of shining scales it chases her, intent on murder and feasting! She's running right at me and with agility I'd never before suspected I may have, I throw myself from her path, striking the floor and rolling to my feet again.

Some tiny voice in my mind says that I can't do that, but I have, and I've no time to wonder at it. Instantly I leap again, evading the monster that has sighted more prey in me. It skids on the stone floor, more massive than I and less agile. That silver blade in the mummy's dead hands glints at me and I run for it!

The woman is somewhere, I catch a glimpse of her in my mad dash for the sword and then she's gone. I can hear the beast bellow its rage too, echoing madly from the chamber's walls.

Time slows sickeningly to my perception. My fingers close on the sword's hilt, snatching it from the brittle, breaking grip of the corpse and with only a moment to spare. Every second passes with the pace of glaciers. I see every detail of the scene with the most profound and perfect clarity, I feel my body turn, lithe and cat-like in slow motion.

The beast is inches from me, it's razor-filled maw wide and reaching for me and I have all the time in the word to study the details of those flesh-shredding serrated teeth. My arm flies straight, driving the curved silver sword into the monster's mouth, slicing effortlessly through bone and skin and brain.

And in that instant, time catches sight of me and the bone-jarring crash of stone and sword and monster is all too sudden. And I'm laying, dazed and hurting on the floor, inches from the dead beast, the sword still jutting sickeningly from it's mouth, the tip in fact, thrust right through and out the back of its skull.

"You killed it!" her voice is strange, like none I've heard before.

I glance around, she's looking between me and the monster, as though not sure which sight is less believable.

I think I must be doing the same for she is quite as strange a thing as the beast I just killed. More than six feet tall, I'm sure, and purple.

I take a moment to look away and back at her. Her skin is a wonderful, delicate shade of lilac, though her long straight hair is black. Human looking, if not for her extraordinary skin, and quite stunningly attractive.

I spring to my feet... As shocked and fatigued as I am I'm up in a trice! Too fast. I bounce experimentally on my toes. I feel so light and strong. The analytical part of my mind nods intelligently and chalks my acrobatics up to that.

"Yes," I say, unnecessarily.

For want of anything better to do I pull the sword out of the monster. There's no blood, none at all on the blade. It's light too. The sword is so very light, it could be made of paper for all it weighs, and it's as bright as mercury, shining like a mirror.

The strange lilac lady watches me for a moment and ventures, "Who are you?"

The way she's looking at me, I'm starting to think I'm very likely as odd to her as she is to me. I glance down at myself. Her question, I now admit inwardly, is not one I can fully answer. I look between my body and my reflection in the silvery surface of the sword. The woman I see is not the one I expect.

Beguilingly beautiful, I say it without pride or exaggeration, a face to fire the lust in almost any woman or man. Fine featured and aristocratic, pale, bloodless skin framed by the most profoundly orange-red hair, long and falling in deliciously twisted ringlets. My eyes though! Oh, the most wonderful, terrible green eyes.

I'm paper-pale, tall and slender as a snake save firm and pleasantly full breasts and wow! The light gravity is so very, very good to the bust! All I have for modestly is a tiny white bolero jacket, sculpted so perfectly to my form and an equally tiny skirt which shows off my white knickers with every little move I make. There's so much pale, bare flesh exposed between my jacket and my skirt, and between my skirt and the tops of my tall white boots.

Suddenly I realise I'm as good as naked, and ogling myself in front of a stranger and a warm blush spreads over my cheeks.

"I... Don't know..." I admit, not knowing where to look, "Who are you? What are you, where are we?"

Questions tumble from my lips and again I scan her and our surroundings. She's wearing clothes of indigo and black fabric which shimmers like silk or satin... Or water or smoke. A long skirt slit right to the thigh and a teeny tiny top that covers her bust but little else. There's quite a lot of sexy dark hair under her arms and I'm proud of myself for keeping my priorities straight and noticing that!

The room we're in though... It's a big stone chamber, square in shape, but the walls lean in to one another. The single trapezoidal door is the only way in our out. That great stone plinth in the middle where I awoke is the only feature. Ah, but the walls... Now I can see carvings on them. Pictures of people and animals and strange geometric patterns, perhaps letters, writing maybe?

"You don't know who you are? Well, I do not know where we are," she smiles an odd, charming smile, "But I am Xellah. And as for what? This morning I was Princess of Lorroth. Now, a fugitive."

"Princess? Wait, Lorroth? Where are we?"

"I told you, I know not, somewhere in the Perigreen."

"Perigreen?" I ask, feeling obvious.

She looks at me like I've just grown a third head "The jungle... What manner of woman are you?"

I can think of no reply but, "What manner of woman are you?"

"I've never seen anyone like you before."

She takes a step closer to me and traces one lilac finger across my pale skin, making me flinch.

"I am an Earthwoman," I say evenly.

It's so profoundly... So abundantly clear to me. I'm not on Earth. This odd woman with her lilac skin and spellbinding purple eyes, that monster I killed, the light gravity and the weird alien writing on the walls of the room. Not to mention names like 'Xellah' and 'Lorroth'. I accept this brute fact with deliberate calm. It's true, so obviously true that I need not wonder at it for now.

"What planet is this?" I add.

She, Xellah, looks confused, "Planet?"

I nod, "What world, land, whatever?"

"Why, Venus."

I wasn't expecting that.

I walk, slowly, to the doorway. The sword is still in my hands, hanging loosely from my fingertips. Walking here is fun, strangely bouncy.

The chamber of my advent is at the top of a great stone ziggurat, I can see that now. It rears vertiginously from verdant green jungle, stretching out as far as I can see. A set of steep stairs leads from this doorway down into the jungle. And the sky! Endless, depthless yellow-white cloud, without break or even change. It's entirely opaque and the colour of old ivory. Not the slightest break in the clouds from horizon to horizon. Here and there flocks of dark specks fly over the green jungle all around this island and I can hear ceaseless sounds of animals of every kind.

Slight movement alerts me to Xellah, now standing at my shoulder looking out with me.

"This is Venus?" I ask.

"Yes."

"I'm a long way from home, Princess."

She nods, "Clearly."

"Have you, have you ever heard of anyone from Earth coming here before?"

"No. Where is Earth?"

"My planet. The blue one. You can... See..." And then it hits me. The clouds never recede on Venus, no-one here will have ever seen the sky.

"What were you about to say?"

I smile ruefully, "It doesn't really matter. Is this... Venus then? Jungle?"

"This is the jungle... The Perigreen. Lorroth is..." she pauses and looks uselessly in several directions before picking one by I know not what means, "That way, I think..."

"And where are we?"

She shrugs, "Why should I know better than you, it seems we're both lost far from home, Earthwoman. This city must have been overtaken centuries ago."

"City!?" I exclaim.

"You didn't see it? Under the canopy most of it still remains, swallowed by the jungle."

"How did you get here?"

"I fled, when the soldiers, the traitors, came for me I fled into the jungle. Now evil women rule Lorroth and I am lost in a dead city, with a stranger who doesn't know her own name." she pauses for a long moment and we stand in silence looking out over the jungle, "You have my thanks. Whatever manner of woman you are, you saved my life and I am in your debt."

I can but essay modesty, "Anyone would have done the same, Princess."

"But you did," She smiles kindly, "What will you do now?"

"I haven't the remotest idea," I admit, still just gazing out over that sea of green jungle, "You?"

"Take back my city, what else?"

"Really?"

"It's my duty. I'll take her back, or die in the attempt. Though... I do not know how..."

"I will help you," It's so simple a thing to say, and I say it so simply.

Good heavens, the idea of it hits me. I have no idea who this woman, this Princess really is, or who she's planning on taking her city from, or how, or why they overthrew her... Yet, even in this instant of realisation, I cannot feel anything but the most profound excitement.

Xellah looks me in the eye for a long moment. Her eyes are rich amethyst, clear and sparking and so very deep. I could lose myself in those eyes so sweetly. Her full purple lips smile and a frisson runs up my spine, my body tingling with a lust for adventure hitherto undetected in my psyche.

"You would do that, Earthwoman? You would join me, and take back my city with me?"

I nod and I think there are tears in her eyes! There are! They roll gently down her cheeks in fat, wet drops.

"Give me your sword," her voice is still even, despite her tears.

She takes the curved, silver sword from my hand, kisses it and casts it roughly to the ground with a clatter. It lies there, glinting in the light.

"To take up a sword thrown down so is to take up arms in my name. To swear yourself to me, and bind me to you. To be a knight of Lorroth and my own champion. Do not do so lightly."

I kneel and pick up the sword, "I do so willingly, my Princess," the words make me shiver with their exotic taste.

Even as I'm standing she throws her arms around me, embracing me tightly. She's taller than me, but very light and I cannot help but hug her back.

"It's done," she says when we have both calmed a little, "Lorroth is to the east, that way, I am certain. I wondered in the jungle a long time, lost and unable to find my way, but with this vantage I am certain of the path. Come."

She starts to lead the way down those steep steps into the jungle.

"Wait, Princess, down there?"

"What other way?"

"But, what if there are more of those... Things?" I motion at the dead monster.

"Threshers. There are. The jungle is alive, but that is our path, and I trust in my champion."

I've not got much to say to that, and the worst is, that is actually our path. We can hardly stay here forever. Xellah leads me down the steps, down and down and down. I'd no idea how tall this ziggurat actually is, many hundreds of feet at least. The edge of the staircase is lined by wide stone banisters carved with more of the strange alien writing. The jungle rises around us. Trees as tall and thick as towers crowd all around us, their roots growing like tentacles over and into the stone.

She's right, too, this is a city. Or it was. There are other buildings of the same ancient blue-grey stone, all of them wrapped in creepers and moss and the roots of these almighty trees. And oh! The sweetness of the air! That air is full of moisture and music and shining drips or water and bright flitting creatures that aren't quite insect or bat or bird, but seem like all three. Multi-legged lizards crawl here and there and I see one get snatched up by an evil-looking fat orange spider-thing. Somewhere deep in the jungle a barking roar rings out hungrily.

I'm feeling very, very naked, and I grip my sword, for I identify it as mine now, very tight.

"I, er, I suppose it's quite a long way to the edge of the jungle?" I enquire as nonchalantly as I can.

"Some way. I fled Lorroth only a little after dawn."

"That's good, I don't want to bump into another one of those... Threshers, you said?"

Xellah nods and smiles, "And the journey back promises to be much more pleasant."

"Princess?"

"Ah, forgive me! Your Princess is only flesh and blood. Can I not enjoy the sight a of a beautiful woman?"

I take that on board, nice to know, "And does my Princess like what she sees?" I ask, slipping my arm about her slender waist.

"Very much so," she purrs, reciprocating the gesture, and then squeezing my bum lewdly.

Stranded deep in an alien jungle I may be, but frankly, I can see a silver lining. I meditate upon this new development while Xellah leads me through the overgrown streets of the ancient city. She sways while she walks, her hips rolling in what I'd almost swear was an entirely exaggerated way... Almost!

I wonder. I do wonder. I wonder at my very lack of wonder. I have accepted entirely my marvellous and entirely unexplained, in fact inexplicable advent on Venus. I should be stunned and raving, or gibbering madly in a corner, or staring catatonic at the shock and unreality of it. But I'm not, and all seems well.

And now this spellbinding alien princes, casts too-obviously desirous eyes over my strange new body, and it seems almost unremarkable to me. It raises almost no wonder in me that she should so willingly accept my initial advance, and that I might so swiftly make such an advance.

And so I wonder at the only thing left wondrous to me, my lack of wonder. This is a strange world.

Too soon I'm forced to let go Xellah's dancing waist. We've come to a bloody carcass in the road. A raptorish looking lizard-monster. It's blue-green skin is rent with savage red gashes as though from claws and teeth even fiercer than its own fearsome examples. It has the tattered remains of a saddle and harness about it and Xellah kneels by the beast's side.

"My Morra," she explains sadly, "The thresher got her, it'd have got me too if you had not been there."

Xellah starts squeamishly trying to free some saddlebags and such from the creature's twisted tack.

"You ride these things?"

She nods.

"I guess we're walking then," I add, obviously.

Xellah nods again and bids me help her sort through her salvaged possessions. She's a sword of her own, curved and slightly longer and narrower than mine and set with a pair of sapphires the size of eggs. She buckles the swordbelt around her waist and repacks the few clothes and provisions undamaged into one bag, which I offer to carry since it seems like the sort of thing I should do.

Again we're moving, walking through the jungley stone city. The tree's roots and limbs grip every surface, cracking stone in their embrace. Most animals flee from our presence and I'm so very glad of it. Xellah is almost instantly at my side again, sliding her hand around me.

And I do not wonder at it.

I feel as though my senses have never been so alive, so accepting and conductive to stimulus. I feel strong, too. My sword is effortlessly light in my hand, and Xellah's bag encumbers me not at all. Even my body is light and I spring lightly over all but the highest impediments to our path, helping my delightful princess to climb up after me as we surmount fallen stones and mighty tree roots. The air is thick and heady and strangely perfumed with the scents of vital life.

"You're sure this is the right way, Princess?" From the top of the ziggurat, all directions had seemed the same to me, unbroken green jungle.

Xellah speaks a little breathlessly, I think she's tiring faster than I, "The green seems thinnest this way, and much taller the other. If Lorroth is truly this way I couldn't say, but we are heading away from the deep jungle."

"How far? I couldn't see the edge."

"I left Lorroth at dawn, and wondered lost a long time in the Perigreen before finding this city. Perhaps we are only a little way in, or very far, I know not."

"How long was that?"

"Perhaps two books, perhaps three, no more,"

That's not very helpful, "How long is a book?"

She seems surprised that I should ask such an elementary question, "There are elven," she explains, "Eleven books of Excellence from one dawn to another."

Ah, well that's... Dear god! I stumble to a halt, staggered by sudden clarity. Venus' day is longer than it's year! I don't even know how long it is, but she's been wondering in the jungle for weeks! When she said she'd been deposed at dawn, she was giving me not a time but a date!

"So..." I manage, "We have, what... three or four 'books' 'till it gets dark?"

"Yes. And if we cannot find our way out of the Perigreen before that, I think even your sword won't save us."

"Dark is bad?"

Just the look in her eyes tells me all I need to know on that score. The almighty trees loom all around us and I can feel the jungle itself, hungry and evil and patient around us. Patient, but not infinitely so.

So we press on, walking and climbing and at times hacking our way through the living maze of red-veined green creepers. Venereal swords, well, my sword and Xellah's are curved and two-edged and the inner edge is ideally sited for bushwhacking through the jungle. I think that's no coincidence.

I want to press on, but Xellah is tiring. I'm not and I ascribe that perhaps to my now body, or to the thick, invigorating air or even to something entirely unknown. Whatever the cause it is given me alone, and Xellah presently asks that we halt for a while.

We've come across a largely whole structure of unknown kind. The city's architects had a unanimous love for the trapezoid and the golden ratio and this building, like all others is shaped entirely by these elements. We cautiously creep inside through the empty doorway and explore all three floors of the stone building. The place is carpeted in tiny blue flowers growing from a springy mass of vines. Xellah thinks it was a home, but not a stick of furniture remains. All of the walls are graven with the same pictograms I've seen throughout the city.