“Who are you?” one of the humans said—the one with wine down the front of his tunic.
She had to stop, and think about that. Who—after all—was she?
She had had a name, once—of that she was sure. In fact, it seemed like it had not been long ago.
But now, what was it? Who was she?
The question was surprisingly difficult. It made her head hurt.
All around her, the music kept playing. Dancers jogged her arms as they swept past. Someone had placed a daisy chain upon her head. She did not know when that had happened, but it seemed right now that it was there.
Who was she?
From somewhere near yet impossibly distant, a kettle drum pounded out the bassline: BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-ba-ba-BUM!-BUM!-BUM!
At that last, booming BUM!, the satyrs stamped their hooves, and she did, too. It felt right.
Her arms began to move, then her legs, then her hips. Then her whole body was moving in time with the music. She had been moving before – why had she stopped? She seemed to recall that someone had asked her a question, but that was no reason to stop. Now she was dancing again, her hooves beating out the BUM!-ba-ba-BUM! tattoo. The beat of the drum was the beat of her heart. Her pulse was the pulse of the music, and music was the pulse of the world. The need to dance was elemental, insatiable – irresistible. She could not have fought it if she wanted to – and why would she want to? To do so would be to deny her own pulse, her own heart. It would spit in the eyes of the gods. It would spurn the only thing that mattered.
Who was she?
“I’m free,” she said, and – as soon as she said it – she knew it was true. The word was correct. She was free. It rang true in her ears, it felt good on her tongue. It sounded just right in time with the music. So she said it again: “Who, me? I’m Free! I’m Free, I’m Free, I’m Free.”
The human grinned a lopsided grin. “Hi,” he said.
Free tapped him on the middle of his forehead, which made his eyes cross. She didn’t stop dancing. “And who are you?” she said, turning the question straight back.
The human looked confused. “Me?” he said. “I’m… I’m…” And for a moment, he looked as if he knew what he wanted to say. Then his voice trailed off, and his eyes crossed yet further, as though a sphinx had just set him a riddle.
“Yes?” Free said, dancing round her new friend in ever-increasing circles. “Yes? Yes? Yes?” She clapped in time with the beat of the drum. “Who are you?” she said – no, demanded. “Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?”
“I’m…” The human started again, then stopped again, no more able to complete the sentence this time then last. Then – very suddenly – his eyes shot wide, his body doubled-over, and he vomited wine-red.
“You’re drunk,” Free said, and laughed. She helped the human to his feet, and wiped his mouth with the edge of his tunic.
“Yes, I am,” the human said, a bit unsteady on his feet. “I’m Drunk.” And he looked at her, deeply relieved. “Thank you,” he said. “For a moment there, I had forgotten.”
The music shifted now; Free felt her body move to match it. Her hips swayed from side to side, her right hoof tapping out the downbeat. From the corner of her eye, she saw Drunk vomiting again. A daisy chain was in her hands – she must have gotten it from somewhere. She waited for Drunk to finish retching, then lay it cockeyed on his head.
Drunk reached up to rub his temples. “I don’t remember how I got here.”
Dancing lightly round his puddle, Free asked him: “Does it matter?” She knew that nothing really mattered if the music played forever.
“No,” Drunk said, slowly. “I guess it doesn’t matter.” His fingers brushed against the daisies. “For some reason or another, it seemed important at the time.”
Free shook her horns at him. “What you need is more wine.”
The next time the music dipped, the dancing satyr dipped down with it. There was a goblet on the grass, where Drunk – or someone else? – had dropped it. She picked the goblet up, and held it like a drill baton. “Wine! Wine! Wine!” She started chanting on the rhythm. “WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-WINE!-WINE!”
She felt two hands on her shoulders, heard other voices echo with her. Drunk was propped against her back, looking game, if worse for wear. At first, she saw, he’d taken hold to keep from falling over. But now a line had formed behind him, and they had taken up the chant.
Thrusting the goblet skyward, Free started dancing, leading her procession at a cantor. Her tail swished back and forth. She bobbed her head from side to side.
“WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-WINE!-WINE!” she said, and the other voices said it with her. “WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-WINE!-WINE!”
She kicked out one leg, then the other, felt it ripple down the line.
“WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-wi-wi-WINE!-WINE!-WINE!”
She heard Drunk slurring along with the rest.
Drunk was dancing better, now, and Free took an almost parental pride in his progression. At first his movements had been off-key and stilted, which she put down to drunkenness, or nerves, or maybe just plain inhibition. But now he was moving smoothly, kicking in-sync with the beat, and Free heard herself cheer aloud for the change that came upon him. Maybe the music had loosened Drunk up. Or maybe his body was changing to better fit the rhythm.
Human legs were not made for dancing, Free thought – their knees bent just the wrong way. Drunk’s new legs were moving much better.
As they galloped past the bandstand, Free could not help but notice that the musicians now beating drums and blowing horns were not the same ones she remembered from her last turn round the floor. Maybe that mattered – or maybe it didn’t. Free tended to think it did not. Behind the current crop of players, scores of other satyrs lay scattered along the ground in ragged ranks four-deep. These over-played players seemed to be in varying stages of catatonia—some merely dazed, others gasping for breath, while some few lay spasmodic, or even still. One tousle-haired casualty still clutched a pan pipe in his hand, and—even as a fresh-lunged replacement came along and prized the instrument from his paralytic grip—his lips kept on moving out and in, making little pantomime toots.
Free raised her goblet in salute to the band, and behind her the line clapped and cheered. The musicians all bowed in reply—dipping deep—an acknowledgement from which the kettle drummer failed to rise. Robbed of its lifeline, the music sputtered, and then stopped, and Free felt as if her heart would cease beating. But then a satyr leapt from somewhere and jumped up on the stage, snatching the sticks from the drummer’s dead hands. And before the dance could die completely, the new drummer straddled the great brass kettle, and she pounded out the bassline as though life itself depended on how hard she hit the skin.
Drunk exhaled a wine-laden breath. “That was a close one,” he said, and Free nodded. Her heart was beating once again, so she went right back to dancing.
She led her line of shaking tails towards the center of the revel, kicking alternately right then left, as they made their way through the gyrating crowd. A traybearer broke from the throng and cut across Free’s path, so that she had to pull up short, accordioning the line behind her in a cascade of bumps and curses. For his part, the traybearer was laughing and screaming as he darted through the scrum, leaving a trail of pomegranate seeds and melon slices behind. The reason for his harried flight was evident a moment later, when a second satyr came crashing after close behind. In one hand, this pursuer clutched a banana. With the other, grasping hand, he grabbed for the traybearer’s ponytailed hair.
“Banana!” the hair-grabber said. “Banana, banana, banana!”
“Woah!” Free said. “Party foul!” And she stretched out one hoof to trip the grasping satyr, who toppled to the ground amidst wayward melon slices. Free hopped lightly from hoof to hoof, dancing in place and humming, as the newly-discombobulated satyr disentangled himself from himself and got back up to his feet. The front of his tunic was streaked with grass stains and bright-colored juices. His jaw was slack, his eyes were dull. In his hand he still clutched the banana.
“Banana?” the satyr said, looking confused about how he’d got there.
Behind Free, Drunk half-burped, half-laughed. “This guy’s bananas,” he pointed and said.
Free nodded her agreement. “That is a good name for him.”
“Bananas?” the satyr said.
“Yes,” Free said. “You’re Bananas.” And taking the satyr gently by the wrist, she raised his hairy hand up level with his face, so that he was staring at the fruit he still held, and which he seemed to have forgotten.
“Banana,” Free pointed and said.
“Banana!” Bananas said, as he regarded this yellow-skinned treasure. His wide-shot eyes took in the fruit with a raw fixity of desire which would have put Alirios to shame. He licked his lips, then formed the word again: “Banana.” He looked like he enjoyed it.
“Yes,” Free said. “Banana.”
Then she nudged Bananas out of the way, and got back to dancing.
“He’s funny,” Drunk said, as the line sashayed past the satyr, who was hurriedly unpeeling his prize. “He’s funny, but I like him.”
“I do, too,” Free said, and then she sighed. She felt a sense of responsibility for Bananas, although she could not know quite why.
They were close to the beating heart, now, where a flower-crowned woman danced atop her raised dais, pouring drinks from her painted amphora. She wore a white and purple toga, wrapped so casually it was couture, and she held a birchblossom scepter in her hand. Where the other dancers’ daisy chains came in as many colors as the sky, hers was violet tinted gold. And although Free could not remember having seen this woman before, she knew that it was Gallia, and she knew that Gallia was her queen.
Free did not know how she knew this, but she felt certain that she did.
Gallia whooped and cheered the approaching dancers, and Free held her goblet out in supplication, into which Gallia made a great show of pouring. Once the cup was full to overflowing, Gallia jumped down off the dais, and took Free in her tawny-armed grip.
“Hello, hello!” the satyr queen said, and she kissed Free once on each cheek, as though the two were oldest friends. She pointed next to Drunk. “And who have you brought me now?”
“This is Drunk,” Free said, by way of introductions, while handing Drunk the overfull goblet. “He has been learning the dance.”
“I am Drunk,” Drunk confirmed, spilling slightly as he drank.
“Hi, Drunk! I’m Gallia!” Gallia said, and grinned. Then she wrapped Drunk in a headlock, spilling yet more of the wine.
“Hello,” Drunk said back. At least, that’s what Free thought he said. The sound got muffled by Gallia’s armpit, and it was hard to make out words.
“Oh, you are fun!” Gallia said, and she noogied Drunk aggressively. “Doesn’t Free just bring the best friends?” By way of reply, Drunk squirmed playfully in her grip.
Throughout all of this friendly horseplay, Drunk somehow maintained his hold on the goblet. His daisy crown would have slipped from his forehead, but was caught on the edge of his horn.
Reaching up to straighten his adornment, Drunk’s face went visibly slack. His fingers found the curvy nub which had rescued the daisies, and his look turned downright confused. He felt his horns from base to tip.
“Did I always have these?” Drunk said.
“Well,” Gallia said, “I haven’t known you long. But I think I’m going to say: ‘yes?’”
Drunk turned his eyes to Free, who shrugged her shoulders back. “I’m pretty sure you always had them,” she said.
“Yes,” Drunk said. “Yes, I’m almost certain that I did.” Then Gallia released him from her headlock, and he slowly shook his head. “I don’t know how I could have forgotten.”
“Happens to the best of us,” Gallia said. She refilled his wine. “Besides, you look better this way.”
“Yes,” Drunk said, slowly. “Much better, I think.”
Gallia slapped him on the back. “And don’t you feel better, too?” she said.
“It’s not that,” Drunk said. “At least, not quite.” He was shaking his head. “You see, I don’t feel better. I am better.”
“Well hello, then, Better!” Gallia said. “I’m Gallia! And you’re my new friend.”
Better dropped awkwardly to one inward-bending knee. Eyes down, he held his goblet out in both hands, like an offer of devotion. He half-rose, then paused, then knelt back down again.
“Do I… bow to you, Gallia?” he said. “I’m sure that I’m not sure, but I think that I’m supposed to bow.”
“You could bow,” Gallia said, and grinned. “But I’d really much rather you danced.”
Free liked the sound of that. And from the speed with which Better rose to his hooves, Free could tell that he liked it, too.
“You are Better,” Free said, as the two locked arms and danced. “Everything is better, here.”
“Here?” Better said, and laughed. “Was there ever anywhere but here?”
“No,” Free said. “There never was. And anyway, what does it matter?”
“It doesn’t,” Better said. “It doesn’t matter.”
So they danced, and they danced, and after a while the new satyr said: “The only thing that matters is the music plays forever.”
Gallia took his cup. “Tell your friends,” she said.