Outside the massive stone walls of the Chateau de Chambord, the French Revolution raged. The crops were failing, the royal coffers were empty, the country was bankrupted by ruinous wars in the Americas, food was scarce, and the people were angry. The baying mob was on a rampage. The fervency of their hatred and the devastating release of their pent up rage was frightening to behold. Mass hysteria swept up and down the countryside of France. Peasants went berserk in their eagerness to loot and pillage. The bastille was in smouldering ruins. People were being beheaded by the scores. Rivers of blood ran down the cobblestoned streets of towns and villages all across the country. Louis XVI and his royal minions were facing imminent slaughter.
However, that was outside—far away from the Chateau de Chambord. Within the silent walls of the stone mansion there was no hint of the political upheaval that was afflicting the rest country. The peasants didn’t dare approach the massive edifice. They had a morbid fear of it. Its thick stone walls and gothic façade filled the hapless viewer with a feeling of horrid, sinking dread. The vacant windows stared out catatonically, almost with a malicious intent. The trees in the vicinity had long since withered and died. Their sickly yellow barks and gnarled rotting roots gave the estate grounds the unsettling appearance of an eerie deserted carnival. The turgid black water of the moat that surrounded the chateau was still and rank. It lay there like a fluid black disease hinting at past pain and future suffering. It hid within its depths the secrets of lost youth and the terror of approaching death.
Dusk fell like black satin on a corpse. A strange miasmic vapour began to creep in from the distant marshes. The distant forest looked like a black threatening cloud that forever hovered on the horizon. The marquis stepped back from the window and walked towards the mantelpiece by the fireplace. He pulled out a poker and stirred the embers. The fire sprang to life and lit up the marquis’ features. His eyes were ebony black—cold and unfeeling; his face was a dry parchment—a palimpsest, if you will, on which layers of unflagging cruelty and wanton debauchery had left their indelible mark. His jaw was rigid and indicated a stern resolve; his lips a thin mirthless line that remained resolutely pursed.
A hesitant cough sounded behind him. He turned slowly, almost regally, to face his housekeeper, Martha. Her shoulders were hunched and she wrung her hands nervously. She stared at the floor not daring to meet the marquis’ gaze.
“Dinner is ready, your lordship,” she finally murmured, timorously peering out from behind the unkempt grey hair that fell over her eyes to glance ever so briefly at her master.
The marquis stared at her with icy hauteur. His upper lip curled with disdain. He smirked at the pitiable creature in front of him. He took a step towards her. The old housekeeper whimpered in fear. He stopped before her, bowed down, and drew his face level with hers. She reeked of sweat and grime. He remained motionless for an entire minute. Martha’s thin frame was wracked with tremors. She didn’t know whether to stay or leave, so she rocked back and forth with uncontrollable fear.
Finally, the marquis hissed slowly into her ear, “Thank you, Martha. You many leave now.”
Martha nearly wept with relief and first shuffled and then ran out of the room. The marquis stared stonily after her.
He made his way to the head of the dining table opposite the fireplace. Martha had outdone herself. The repast was extensive. It was a banquet for one: wild mushroom and bisques soup with cheddar potato and tomato basil; pear and gorgonzola spinach salad; Paté Maison and cornichons as appetizers; bruschetta de Flageolets; truite aux Amandes, beef tenderloin, stuffed baby chicken, braised lamb, roast duck, grilled pork… the table was filled to bursting.
The marquis sat down and tucked into his meal with a rarefied gusto that anyone who knew him would have recognised as a defining characteristic. He was a man who relished his food. He savoured each mouthful and ate with the meticulous care of a gourmet who appreciated the subtle textures and flavours of the fare before him. Each mouthful was an exquisite burst of pleasure. He was also a connoisseur of fine wine. He held the crystal wine glass delicately between his fingers and gazed appreciatively at its ruby red contents. It contained a rare 14th century cabernet sauvignon straight from the cellars of the Valois Dukes of Burgundy, bottled centuries ago during the Avignonese papacy. The 1370 vintage would have cost a fortune, but the marquis had friends in the right places. He never had to do anything as crass as paying for his wine.
He swirled the deep red liquid, allowing it to breathe. He noted its viscosity with interest. Then, ever so gently and deliberately, he raised the rim to his nose. He inhaled slowly and deeply. An intense burst of vanilla, blackcurrant, and cedar filled his nostrils. He savoured the warm aromas and lowered the glass to his lips and took a refined sip. A display of cherry and cassis overwhelmed the front of his palate. As he rolled the drought of blushful Hippocrene in his mouth he relished its texture and aspirated. A bouquet of new aromas filled the back of his nose. Finally, he allowed himself to gently swallow the wine. He nodded with stifled exuberance at its aged tannins. A soothing aftertaste of mulled spices and cardamom filled his palate. The marquis was pleased.
As he was about to tuck into his honey glazed quail stuffed with foi gras, a distant bell arrested his attention. The marquis face darkened. He was a picture of frozen thunder. Who dared to call at the chateau at this time? He brooked no interruptions to his meals.
In the distance, the marquis heard the hurried sound of scurrying feet and presently the dull creaking of the drawbridge being lowered over the moat. A brief interlude of muffled whispers was followed by slow shuffling footsteps. It was obvious the visitor was not overly eager at the prospect of encountering the marquis.
The footsteps stopped outside the dining room door. The marquis looked up at the rustic visitor. He was an unkempt creature with grizzly grey hair and an unshaven chin. His lips were chapped and his finger nails filled with dirt. He too couldn’t bring himself to meet the marquis’ gaze. He held his hat in his hands and stared at his soiled boots.
The marquis stared at him in silence. He was enjoying the other man’s discomfort. Finally, he said, “Yes, René. What is it?”
René breathed a sigh of relief that the silence was broken, but he was still as diffident as ever. “I… ah… that is, your Lordship… it’s ready—that request—your request is ready for delivery…” His voice trailed and he gulped a few times trying desperately to collect his thoughts and worrying every moment of saying the wrong thing.
“Send the cargo round the back, René; like you always do.”
René nodded and quickly stepped away, glad to depart from the menacing presence of the marquis. The marquis sipped the last of his wine and walked to his prized violin, a unique 1720 Stradivari specially built in his heyday by the famous Italian luthier and commissioned by the Count Gabriel-Jean Molitor. He nestled the violin on his chin and the bow gently caressed the strings. The mellifluous and melancholic strains of Tomaso Albinoni’s Adagio for Strings in G minor filled the air. The exquisitely haunting melody redolent of wasted youth and lost beauty resounded through the stone walls of the chateau.
Outside the drawbridge, René was busy unloading his human cargo of peasant maidens and young vestals from the neighbouring lands. Their attenuated screams competed with the melody from the violin. The marquis paid not the least attention to the terrified and hysterical shrieks of the young women being forced into the chateau dungeon below. His focus was only on the sublime harmony of the baroque piece.
Presently the screams died down. The drawbridge was raised and René and Martha departed down the deserted mist-filled path leading away from the chateau. The marquis was left alone except for the hostages in the dark bowels of the mansion.
He put his precious violin away and stepped out of the dining room. A deathly silence suffused the air, broken only by the slow measured footsteps of the marquis walking down the stone corridor. Phantasmagoric paintings of counts and barons from a distant age lost in the haze of time looked down on him; the eyes of the portraits almost seemed to follow him as he approached the narrow stairway leading down to the dungeon.
A heavy oak door sealed the cells of the dungeon from the rest of the chateau. The marquis produced a heavy leaden key and unlocked the door. He stepped through into the dark interior and locked the door behind him. Tarn candles placed along the stony walls threw ominous shadows that flickered and danced against the cells. Iron chains, metal cuffs, leather horsewhips, barbed wires, and hunting crops were carefully arranged on a table at the far end.
The marquis turned and faced the terrified crew of peasant girls bound and gagged in separate cells stretching as far as the eye could see. Before he could take a step forward a high-pitched ringing tone resounded in his ear. The flickering candle light glowed brighter. A white circle of light with shimmering fractal patterns filled the room. Ripples in the fabric of space began to form and spread out in waves. A stream of holographic numbers and stochastic digital information hovered in the air. Quite abruptly the scene collapsed. The figure of the marquis broke out into quantised bits and disappeared. With a final swish, all reality narrowed to a point and broke down into nothingness.
Silence fell like a terrible pall. Jared finally stirred and unplugged the direct cortical interface from the neural net in his metabrain. He checked the audio-visual input device. It seemed fine. Yet the holographic monitor connected to his prosthetic cortex indicated a decrease in oscillatory activity in the delta and theta frequency bands. No wonder his simulation chip had failed. He looked around his cramped and congested cubicle. Unmade sheets, weeks old laundry, and piles of socks framed the scene before him. From his space station bay window he caught a quick glimpse of earth before the rotational movement of the station hid it from view. Not for the first time did he reflect on how glad he was to be leaving that simmering, smog-filled, pestilence-ridden planet.
He unplugged the quantum crystal memory cube and looked at the title: The Fantasies of the Marquis de Saade. He chucked it on the metal desk beside his pod. Littered on the table were other real life simulation titles: The Life and Times of Ted Bundy; The Secret life of Jack the Ripper; The Fetishes of Ed Gein; and many more. Jared hooked up the next simulation memory cube and disappeared into his next digital fantasy. The journey to the Sirius binary star system was long and he had a whole host of lives to experience.
