[Gormenghast] "Slumming" (PG-13)
Oct. 4th, 2011 11:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mtxref_ficAuthor's Note: Written for "Fic_promptly"'s Author's Choice, Author's Choice, The Bordello In Faerie (Michael Swanwick) Set sometime during the events of "Titus Awakes". Titus/OFC. Partly inspired by New Crobuzon, the creation of China Mieville, who's likely the closest thing to a spiritual successor to Mervyn Peake.
The path Titus had chosen had brought him far afield, to a city vaster than but just as hobble-scobble in its construction as Gormenghast. The streets were as crooked as the trees in the Tangled Woods, and the denizens, either walking the streets or driving by in peculiar equipages, or hawking strange wares on the corners of the streets, were like nobody Titus had seen before. Some looked like people as he knew them, others appeared to be part man and part beast, or even part insect. The air hummed with strange music and peculiar energies, and he found himself caught up in the throngs that flowed through the streets, like corpuscles in a winding vein.
At length, he found himself discharged into a seedier part of the city, where broken windows glowered down at him as if at an intruder. He stopped under the portico of a building over whose door hung a red glass lantern casting a warm glow to invite the weary traveler.
A blowsy woman in a red gown opened the door to him. "What sewer were you coughed out of, boy?" she asked, a smirk crossing her cracked, rouged lips.
"Forgive my appearance, I have been walking the world for many days," he said, bowing to her. "I would rest myself in your lodgings if you would have me, madame."
The madam took him by the hand and drew him into a parlor that smelled of perfume and worn horsehair furniture. Several fading gutter-blossoms sat in artful poses on the aging divans and settees that lined the room, eying him with invitation. "You've come to the right place," she said. "I'll see that you find a room and I'll send one of the girls to draw you a bath. Mayvin!" She called out to a squat boy whose face reminded Titus of a frog's. "Take this one up to Thainsel's room an' send her in to scrub him down. See that he has plenty of warm water and sweet soap."
Ten minutes later, found Titus sitting nearly up to his neck in hot water that smelled of flowers whose name he did not know.
At length, the fraying violet curtain that covered the door to the bath parted and a slender figure entered clad in a gossamer rose gown to match the gossamer wings that rose from her shoulders.
"May I wash your back for you, young master?" she asked, opening the robe and dropping it behind her.
"Yes, you may, I cannot refuse someone as lovely as you, and besides, I cannot reach every inch of my back," he replied, looking up and down her slim form. Her body looked as if it had been carved from a single block of ivory, but her face, though carefully painted, showed the shadows of care about her brow and mouth. The sight nearly caused him to pull away in deference, but the need in his loins impelled him to draw close to her, letting her fold her wings about his head as she cleansed his skin, laying a kiss on the back of his neck...
The path Titus had chosen had brought him far afield, to a city vaster than but just as hobble-scobble in its construction as Gormenghast. The streets were as crooked as the trees in the Tangled Woods, and the denizens, either walking the streets or driving by in peculiar equipages, or hawking strange wares on the corners of the streets, were like nobody Titus had seen before. Some looked like people as he knew them, others appeared to be part man and part beast, or even part insect. The air hummed with strange music and peculiar energies, and he found himself caught up in the throngs that flowed through the streets, like corpuscles in a winding vein.
At length, he found himself discharged into a seedier part of the city, where broken windows glowered down at him as if at an intruder. He stopped under the portico of a building over whose door hung a red glass lantern casting a warm glow to invite the weary traveler.
A blowsy woman in a red gown opened the door to him. "What sewer were you coughed out of, boy?" she asked, a smirk crossing her cracked, rouged lips.
"Forgive my appearance, I have been walking the world for many days," he said, bowing to her. "I would rest myself in your lodgings if you would have me, madame."
The madam took him by the hand and drew him into a parlor that smelled of perfume and worn horsehair furniture. Several fading gutter-blossoms sat in artful poses on the aging divans and settees that lined the room, eying him with invitation. "You've come to the right place," she said. "I'll see that you find a room and I'll send one of the girls to draw you a bath. Mayvin!" She called out to a squat boy whose face reminded Titus of a frog's. "Take this one up to Thainsel's room an' send her in to scrub him down. See that he has plenty of warm water and sweet soap."
Ten minutes later, found Titus sitting nearly up to his neck in hot water that smelled of flowers whose name he did not know.
At length, the fraying violet curtain that covered the door to the bath parted and a slender figure entered clad in a gossamer rose gown to match the gossamer wings that rose from her shoulders.
"May I wash your back for you, young master?" she asked, opening the robe and dropping it behind her.
"Yes, you may, I cannot refuse someone as lovely as you, and besides, I cannot reach every inch of my back," he replied, looking up and down her slim form. Her body looked as if it had been carved from a single block of ivory, but her face, though carefully painted, showed the shadows of care about her brow and mouth. The sight nearly caused him to pull away in deference, but the need in his loins impelled him to draw close to her, letting her fold her wings about his head as she cleansed his skin, laying a kiss on the back of his neck...
